Will Big Z make his Kentucky basketball debut Friday night? He’s not yet eligible to play.

When will Kentucky fans get their first look at Big Z on the basketball court?

Probably not this week.

UK plays its first exhibition game of the 2023-24 preseason against Georgetown College on Friday night in Rupp Arena, and it’s highly unlikely that Zvonimir Ivisic will be a part of it.

The UK athletics department released a statement Thursday to clarify previous comments related to Ivisic’s eligibility. The statement makes clear that the 7-foot-2 freshman from Croatia has not yet been cleared to compete against outside competition, making him ineligible to play against Georgetown on Friday night.

“As a department, we want to clarify, Zvonimir Ivisic has been cleared to practice and play in all intrasquad games. That said, he can not compete against outside competition, including exhibition games, until he is approved by the NCAA,” the statement said. “There was miscommunication in this regard and, as we always do, we plan to adhere to NCAA rules. Until he is fully cleared, Zvonimir will be withheld from games against outside competition.”

UK coach John Calipari said Saturday night that Ivisic was good to go for the Wildcats’ two exhibition games, as long as he was ready from a basketball standpoint. Calipari said at his media day press conference Wednesday that Ivisic would “probably” make his debut against Kentucky State in the team’s final exhibition on Nov. 2 and did not completely rule him out of Friday’s game.

It’s now clear that Calipari was wrong about Ivisic’s current eligibility status. And even if he is granted full eligibility by the NCAA in time for Friday night’s game, it sounds unlikely he’d be available to play anyway.

Calipari said Wednesday that he put Ivisic back into “ramp-up mode” coming out of the weekend after he was not ready physically to play in last week’s Blue-White Game due to conditioning issues. He would have been eligible to compete in that scrimmage.

The UK coach said Ivisic would work out on the side Wednesday rather than go through full “body to body” workouts, and then he would evaluate whether he could go full-on in Thursday’s practice. When asked to clarify whether he thought Ivisic would be ready for the Georgetown game, Calipari said his debut would “probably” come next week against Kentucky State, the Wildcats’ final exhibition of the preseason. As of Thursday afternoon, the NCAA was still reviewing his case for eligibility.

“I want him to be at his best. We’ll continue the ramp-up,” Calipari said, noting that Ivisic is probably “a little frustrated with me,” but that he wanted the freshman to be in a better spot physically to make an impact when he does wear a UK jersey for the first time.

What does that “ramp-up” process entail?

“Well, it starts with what his issues are,” Calipari said. “You deal with those and then you deal with the conditioning, and then you deal with 2-on-2, 3-on-3. And then, ‘All right, you’re ready to go.’ And I think we threw him in a little bit too fast in what we did. And he was good. Anybody that came in and watched was like, Yeah, he’s good.’ He’s a good basketball player. He’s not like King Kong. He’s another piece for us.”

Calipari promised the crowd at Big Blue Madness on Oct. 13 that Ivisic, who only arrived in Lexington the previous day, would make his on-court debut for the Wildcats during the Blue-White Game on Oct. 21.

The 20-year-old went through a full practice for the first time with his new teammates on the evening of Oct. 18. By the time the Blue-White scrimmage came around — with three practices under Ivisic’s belt — Calipari announced that he would not play in the event, after all.

Instead, Ivisic had a short individual workout with UK assistant coach Orlando Antigua on the court before the game and watched the rest of the action from the sideline. Calipari said after the scrimmage that he shouldn’t have put a start date on Ivisic’s public debut. He said the UK newcomer was cramping badly after his early practice sessions and — though Ivisic still wanted to play in the Blue-White Game — Calipari decided to hold him out as a precaution.

“We could have him for here, and then I’d be a man of my word. Or we could worry about the season. And I’m worried about the season,” Calipari said. “So I want to give him some time. Let’s see what this body can take.”

The Kentucky coach has also tried to temper the outsized expectations around Ivisic multiple times since his arrival in the United States two weeks ago. At SEC media day last week, Calipari explicitly said that his new center was not yet ready to have a sizable impact on a real game. After the Blue-White scrimmage Saturday night, he reiterated that.

“My worry is: physically, how much can he play? That’s my worry,” he said. “Now, let me say this. After three days of practice, it wasn’t a whole lot.”

Big Z and the NCAA

Ivisic is still awaiting word on his NCAA eligibility, due to his time spent as a professional player in Europe.

Calipari has said multiple times that he’s confident that Ivisic will ultimately be ruled eligible to play by the NCAA. There is no set timetable for that decision to be made public, and it won’t necessarily come before the Wildcats’ season opener against New Mexico State on Nov. 6.

Ivisic is one of three 7-footers on Kentucky’s 2023-24 roster, but none of them appear ready to contribute. The other two — Aaron Bradshaw and Ugonna Onyenso — remain sidelined after undergoing offseason surgeries for foot injuries. Calipari said two weeks ago that he expected both players back in “5-6 weeks,” but he has since said he shouldn’t have put a return date on either player and acknowledged that it could take longer for them to return to the court.

Neither Bradshaw nor Onyenso had any specific timetable for their return to the court when asked Wednesday.

Following Kentucky’s exhibition game against Georgetown on Friday, the Wildcats will play a final exhibition against Kentucky State on Nov. 2. The season opener is Nov. 6, and the Cats’ first major test — against No. 1-ranked Kansas and preseason All-America center Hunter Dickinson — is set for Nov. 14.

That’s not much time for Big Z to get acclimated to American basketball and his new team.

In his first public comments since arriving in Lexington, he recorded an episode of UK’s “Behind Kentucky Basketball” podcast, which was posted Tuesday night. There, Ivisic acknowledged the primary obstacle that Calipari says is keeping him off the court in the short term.

“I think the most important thing that I have to be working on is my strength and my conditioning. That’s the most important thing,” he said. “… The other things will come.”

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