Davion Mintz put his faith in God and extra work to end his shooting slump

Davion Mintz got a basketball from coach John Calipari before Saturday's game to recognize he had reached 1,000 points in his collegiate career. (UK Athletics Photo)

Davion Mintz couldn’t help himself. He brought the ceremonial basketball he was given before Kentucky’s win over Georgia Saturday recognizing that he went over the 1,000—point mark in his collegiate career a game earlier in UK’s loss at Georgia.

Mintz had 19 points on 7-for-10 shooting (5-for-7 on 3’s) in the 92-77 victory over Georgia.

“I am so proud of myself,” said Mintz. “I am hugging it (the basketball) like this because I have to give it to my Dad. I know it will not be mine in a few minutes.”

Mintz was at Creighton for four years — he missed the fourth year with an injury — before coming to UK as a graduate transfer during the 9-16 season. He opted to return to UK for a sixth year under the COVID relief measure.

“I have been through so much,” Mintz said. “It has been a roller coaster for me. This means so much to me. It was not my identity to be a scorer at Creighton.”

He admits he knew how close he was to 1,000 points and that did enter his thought process when he was contemplating whether he would come back to Kentucky for a second season.

“Just to sit here and hold it (the basketball) means so much to me. I am really happy I got that,” Mintz said.

Kentucky coach John Calipari said Mintz was “outstanding” against Georgia — but not because of his offense.

“He defended. He came up with balls. He tried to take charges. He flew (up the court),” Calipari said. “He only had one turnover. One play he passes up a shot and drove into a bad shot. I jumped him. ‘Shoot the ball. We can’t rebound your bad shot.'”

That doesn’t bother Mintz. He can’t take criticism. He has not pouted about not starting this season even though he probably thought he would when he came back. Instead, Georgia transfer Sahvir Wheeler, freshman TyTy Washington and Davidson transfer Kellan Grady are UK’s top three guards.

It didn’t help that Mintz had been 3-for-19 from 3-point range in the previous five games before making three of eight against LSU when he scored 16 points. He’s now 8-for-15 from long range the last two games and has raised his 3-point percentage to 34.6 for the year.

“I have been working my tail off. It can’t rain forever,” Mintz said. “The sun has to come out eventually.

“Honestly, I just put my faith in God. I prayed about it. All the signs God was giving me was to just keep working. Don’t stop. The game of basketball teaches you so much about life. You can be putting in so much work and sometimes things just don’t go well for you. But if you just stay faithful and committed to whatever it is you want in life, it’s going to click. This right here, these past two games have been a testimony of my hard work honestly. And the encouragement from the staff and my teammates really.”


Mintz admitted he’s not always been so positive. He called himself a “sore loser who was super into myself” as a kid and was always wanting to be better than his older brother. He learned that was the wrong attitude.

“If I am leaking negative energy, it is going to spread like a virus to other people,” Mintz said. “Even when things are not the best for you, you have to smile. I have not been like that my whole life but it’s how you have to be as a person and things will fall in line for you.”