Where There's a Will, There's Oweh

Mark Pope built his first Kentucky roster through the transfer portal in a matter of weeks. Otega Oweh came from Duquesne, where he had averaged solid numbers but played in front of crowds that wouldn't fill the lower bowl of Rupp Arena. When he committed to Kentucky, the reaction from BBN was polite curiosity at best. He wasn't John Wall. He wasn't DeMarcus Cousins. He wasn't even the biggest name in Pope's first portal class.

Then the games started. Oweh averaged 16.2 points per game as a junior — good enough for second on the team. He shot 49.2% from the field and 35.5% from three. He pulled down 4.7 rebounds per game from the guard position. He scored 583 total points in 36 games, playing 28.3 minutes a night. And Kentucky went 24-12 and made the Sweet Sixteen.

Nobody was calling him a nobody anymore.

Kentucky played nine games decided by five points or fewer this season. They won six of them. Otega Oweh was on the floor for all nine, playing 30-plus minutes in each one.

A one-point win over LSU on January 14. A two-point win over Tennessee on January 17. A five-point win over Texas on January 21. A three-point win over Tennessee on February 7. Kentucky went 12-7 in close games across Oweh's two seasons — 6-4 as a junior, 6-3 as a senior. That is not a coincidence. That is a player who elevates when the stakes are highest.

And then came Santa Clara.

The box score will say Kentucky 89, Santa Clara 84, overtime. It will say Oweh scored 35 points on 11-of-24 shooting, grabbed 8 rebounds, dished 7 assists, and played 43 of 45 possible minutes. It will say he went 10-of-12 from the free throw line.

What the box score won't say is that Santa Clara had four players in double figures and refused to go away. It won't say that Oweh was the only reason Kentucky didn't fold when the Broncos pushed the game to overtime. It won't capture the moment when he looked at his teammates during a timeout and they looked back and everybody in that huddle knew: he's not letting us lose this game.

That is 1,202 career points distilled into a single night. That is two years of showing up, of being the guy, of carrying a program through a coaching transition and 13 losses and an SEC Tournament exit and still — still — believing that the season had more to give.

On Sunday, Kentucky plays Iowa State in the second round of the NCAA Tournament. The Cyclones are a 2-seed. They have the nation's best 3-point shooter, a point guard who holds the program record for steals, and an All-American forward who may or may not be healthy enough to play.

Otega Oweh will be asked to do what he has done 70 times in a Kentucky uniform: show up, compete, and refuse to let the moment be bigger than the man. His career at UK will end sometime — maybe Sunday, maybe later, maybe in the Final Four. Nobody knows.

But when it does end, Kentucky fans will remember where they were when Otega Oweh scored 35 in overtime against Santa Clara. They'll remember the free throws. They'll remember the will.

Where there's a will, there's Oweh.