Kentucky targets lead USA to gold medal at FIBA U18 AmeriCup.

And they did so in front of new UK head coach Mark Pope.

In front of new Kentucky coach Mark Pope, a number of UK recruiting targets helped lead the United States to the gold medal at the FIBA U18 AmeriCup in Buenos Aires, Argentina over the weekend.

The United States won its seventh consecutive gold medal in the event with a 110-70 win over Argentina on Sunday as top-5 prospect and top-ranked 2025 point guard Darius Acuff finished with 26 points, 9 assists, 6 rebounds and 3 steals and was named the tournament’s Most Valuable Player.

Mikel Brown, who along with Acuff was named to the event’s all-tournament team, dished out nine assists in the gold medal game while Jasper Johnson came off the bench to score 19 points, hitting four 3-pointers for the Americans.

Argentina led 30-28 in the first half before Team USA uncorked an 18-0 run to take a 52-36 lead into halftime. In the third quarter, the United States outscored Argentina 37-14 to put the game out of reach. Team USA finished a perfect 6-0 in the event, winning its games by an average of 41.5 points per game.

The USA U18 team was led by head coach Tommy Lloyd (Arizona) along with assistants Grant McCasland (Texas Tech) and Micah Shrewsberry (Notre Dame).

The Americans were led by Acuff, who averaged a team-high of 17.8 points to go along with 4.7 rebounds and 4.0 assists per game. He took an official visit to Kentucky for Big Blue Madness back in October and the Wildcats were thought to be among the leaders for Acuff prior to the coaching change.

Brown, who is relatively new to UK’s recruiting radar, averaged 10.3 points, 5.2 assists, 3.3 rebounds, and 1.3 steals. Trey McKenney, who has also begun to draw recent interest from the new staff, averaged 10.8 points, 5.3 rebounds, 2.2 assists and 1.3 steals. Shelton Henderson, another new name, averaged 8.0 points, 4.5 rebounds, 1.5 assists and 1.3 steals.