Kentucky reaches out to St. John's guard Joson Sanon

Do we have our player-to-be-named-later in the Donnie Freeman trade between Mark Pope and Rick Pitino? Just days after losing out on the Syracuse transfer, Kentucky has reached out to a new target — one coming off a season at St. John’s.

Joson Sanon, a former four-star recruit out of high school and the No. 58 player in the transfer portal, is receiving interest from the Wildcats.

Sam Kayser of League Ready reports that Kentucky joins a list that also includes Alabama, Auburn, North Carolina, Kansas, Oregon, Texas A&M, UCLA, Texas Tech and Texas, among others.

St. John’s transfer Joson Sanon has heard from the following programs since entering the transfer portal, source told @LeagueRDY:

Alabama
Auburn
Kentucky
North Carolina
Kansas
Oregon
West Virginia
Vanderbilt
Cincinnati
NC State
Texas A&M
UCLA
Mississippi State
Georgetown
Texas… pic.twitter.com/4AVy5mtZxd

— Sam Kayser (@KayserHoops) April 22, 2026

The 6-5 guard out of Fall River, MA averaged 7.9 points and 2.4 rebounds per contest with the Johnnies in 2025-26 while finishing with shooting splits of 34/34/77. Prior to his time at St. John’s, he spent his freshman season at Arizona State with none other than Jayden Quaintance, averaging 11.9 points and 3.4 rebounds with 42/37/71 splits. He’s played 64 total games in his career with 23 starts.

The Wildcats saw him in person earlier in the season, Sanon going for 12 points on 12-12 at the free-throw line while adding two rebounds and two steals in 19 minutes. Kentucky won that one 78-66 in Atlanta. His other big performances include 16 points (5-10 FG, 4-7 3PT) vs. Auburn, 15 points (3-5 3PT) vs. Seton Hall and 13 points (4-9 FG, 3-4 3PT) at Georgetown, among others.

Sanon was the No. 25 overall prospect and No. 6 shooting guard in the 2024 Rivals Industry Ranking, originally picking the Sun Devils over Indiana, Oklahoma State, Arizona and Providence, among others. He actually took an unofficial visit to Kentucky on March 6, 2024 — just weeks before John Calipari’s departure and Mark Pope’s arrival in Lexington.

Could a full-circle moment be on the horizon for the standout shooter originally out of Massachusetts? We have confirmed contact as Pope searches for snipers.