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How are the Kentucky Wildcats celebrating Americas 250th birthday? Theyre home for the 4th of July with their friends and family and it sounds like there will be plenty of time spent out on the water, maybe with a cold beverage or two, for those old enough to partake.
KSR caught up with a couple of sharpshooters to wrap up the teams third week of summer workouts, both thrilled to head home for the long weekend and get those grills fired up.
Milan Momcilovic is back in Wisconsin, enjoying some well-deserved time off, hitting the lake in his hometown before heading back to Lexington for the start of week four.
Yeah, Im going back home, going on Pewaukee Lake, so thatll be fun, he said.
We get 3 days, so Ill be back Sunday.
Whats on the menu? Burgers, brats, Wisconsin cheese maybe a drink or two, the newest Wildcat joked.
As for Trent Noah, hes in Harlan doing the same thing, getting his swimming trunks on to stay cool in this insane heat.
Im hoping to get back home and maybe hit the lake a little bit, he told KSR.
The 4th of July is always fun, cant go wrong.
Its been so hot, so youve got to find some body of water.
A favorite childhood tradition? Fireworks with the family, something hes surprised worked out so well over the years with his cousins letting the light show rip right in the middle of the yard every Independence Day.
No emergency room visits, only fun and quality time with his loved ones.
Family fireworks for sure, the cousins shooting them off in the yard, he said.
Probably wasnt the safest thing looking back on it [laughs], but we all made it through.
That was fun, everybody all together.
Whats the Noah family cooking up on Americas birthday? Hes proud to say mom is the superstar when it comes to day-to-day meals, but his dad is the grillmaster when its time to light some charcoal.
Hell handle the traditional meats while shell nail the other dishes.
My mom is normally the cook she normally cooks everything, except the grill.
My dad kind of breaks it out every now and then, normally the traditional burgers and hot dogs.
My dad has the upper hand on the grill, but my mom, shes got everything else.
Happy 4th of July, Big Blue Nation! If you want to be like your favorite Wildcats, it sounds like you had better get to the lake and eat a cheeseburger today before lighting off some fireworks after dark.
Stay safe and go Cats.
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Latvian record holder Nikolass Deicmans has signed with Kentucky for the recruiting class of 2026.
Deicmans holds the Latvia national record in the 200 backstroke at 2:01.18 at the 2026 Lithuanian Championships, breaking his own record of 2:01.52 from the 2025 Lithuanian Championships.
He is also the Latvian record holder in the SCM event, swimming 1:53.47 earlier this month at the Latvian Championships to take three seconds off Uvis Kalnins 2016 time of 1:56.07.
He has also represented Latvia internationally at a few different meets including the 2025 World Championships, where he swam the 100 and 200 backstroke, finishing 51st in the 100 (57.18), and 36th in the 200 (2:02.50).
Despite the new five-for-five eligibility rules taking effect, Deicmans will likely only have four years of collegiate eligibility, turning 20 at the beginning of April.
The new rule states that an athletes clock will start at full-time college enrollment or the academic year after their 19th birthday, whichever comes first.
For Deicmans, this means that his clock likely started last fall, giving him a maximum four years at Kentucky.
Deicmans Lifetime Best and Conversions | Event | SCM/LCM | | | 200 Free (LCM) | 1:52.83 | 1:37.08 | | 100 Back (SCM) | 52.41 | 46.99 | | 200 Back (SCM) | 1:53.47 | 1:41.37 | | 200 IM (SCM) | 2:01.06 | 1:48.34 | Kentucky is coming off an 8th place finish at the SEC Championships last season, scoring 582 points to sit about 30 points behind LSU (614) and almost 80 points ahead of Texas A&M (503.5).
Deicmans converted times fall just outside of NCAA qualification in his events with the 100 back cutline sitting at 44.82 last season and the 200 back cutline sitting at 1:39.53.
At the SEC Championships, however, Deicmans could be a multi-event point scorer.
His 100 backstroke converted time would have been 25th in prelims, just four hundredths behind Hayden Meyers of Georgia, who finished 24th in 46.94.
In the 200 back, his converted time would have qualified for the B final, where he would have finished 13th overall.
His 200 free and 200 IM would both have been outside of scoring position.
The University of Kentucky retains its top two 100 backstrokers, Lysander Osman and Devin Naoroz from last season, who are both faster than Deicmans converted times.
Only Naoroz was faster in the 200 backstroke, though.
He will join a small recruiting class of all international swimmers for 2026 consisting of Italian Filippo Bertoni, Estonias Siim Keskula, and Romanias Darius-Matei Trenchea.
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Over the last several recruiting classes, the University of Kentucky Basketball program has come up short in terms of landing the big fish in either recruiting or the transfer portal.
But recently, head coach Mark Pope and his staff landed Milan Momcilovic the top target in the entire transfer portal from Iowa State to join their team for the upcoming season.
While many people clearly played a role in getting Momcilovic to Kentucky, former Wildcat Tyler Herro clearly had his fingerprints on the move.
Tylers dad Chris was Momcilovics coach back in AAU and (of course) was heavily connected to UK through Tyler back around the COVID years when Momcilovic was being recruited out of high school.
Tyler reached out to me.
Chris (Herro) and my dad are pretty good friends because they used to coach together on the EYB, Momcilovic said during Thursdays media scrum.
So, he was calling me, and he was obviously telling me, Go to Kentucky.
Go to Kentucky.
I really like the Herro family.
Obviously, I listen to them, but it was my decision at the end of the day.
Though Kentucky never reached out originally back during his high school recruiting, they did come knocking most recently during this past summer, and with the help of Herros encouragement, Momcilovic will represent the Big Blue Nation this fall in Lexington for a chance to try and bring banner No.
9 home to UK.
Cant love this enough.
No return to college bball for Billy D.
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