Playing an Impressive 27-Point Winning Game Against Kentucky, Know All About UNCW’s Forward Trazarien White

The Wildcats faced an unexpected upset in a recent matchup against the SeaHawks. The main spark of this game was Trazarien White who put on an astounding display of back-to-back dunks, scoring 27 points, serving Kentucky its first non-conference home loss since 2020. White’s performance firmly established his reputation as the Seahawks’ key player.

Before this encounter, the Wildcats were considered one of the strong contenders for the SEC. But they couldn’t withstand the Seahawks. The underdog team pulled an 80-73 win over the Kentucky making this one their first win against a nationally-ranked opponent. And the main credit for this goes to White.

Sensational Seahawk

Considered one of the most explosive players in the CAA (Coastal Athletic Association), White has been averaging 18.8 points per game, 5.2 rebounds, and 1.7 assists. Moreover, he is been ranked #53rd with his field goal percentage of 60.6%.

Besides being selected to the All-CAA team in 2022-23, White also accumulated the All-CAA Tournament in UNCW’s run to the conference title game. Moreover, he scored 14 points and eight rebounds against Drexel, 21 points and 11 rebounds against Hofstra, and 16 points against College of Charleston. This earned him a tournament-tested player.

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In addition, he also became the MVP of the Baha Mar Nassau Championship held during the Thanksgiving week.

How did UNCW beat Kentucky?

The Seahawks being an underdog team weren’t expected to drop a bomb on Kentucky since the Wildcats are one of the strongest NCAA contenders. However, there was one thing that kept the Seahawks going.

Looking a few years back, in 2007, when Kentucky hadn’t lost a game in the regular season since 2001, was defeated by the Bulldogs by 84-68 in the 2k Sports College Hoops Classic. The UNC Wilmington’s head coach Takayo Siddle was one of the bench players of the Gardner-Webb Runnin’ Bulldogs, who scored 8 points, with 2 rebounds and 3 assists.

However, the key to their victory now and then was that they simply ‘believed’. That’s what it took for the Seahawks to win this matchup. Elaborating on his win in 2007, Siddle said, “I mentioned it briefly yesterday (laughter). It was so long ago, and they don’t want to hear about my glory days at all. My message was ‘believe.’ Anything can happen and little Gardner-Webb came in here back in 2007 and we had the same outcome.”

“We quickly moved on (from Gardner-Webb talk) because they didn’t want to hear that but I think they understood the message I was trying to get across to them. We came in here believing that we could win the game, we know how talented we are as a ball club. Our guys did a tremendous job executing,” added Siddle while explaining the moment he was giving the pregame pep talk to the Seahawks.

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The recent matchup against Kentucky was the Seahawks’ first challenging road swing on their season campaign trip, with many more to go.