As a Kentucky fan, there’s always been a bit of a legend surrounding the 2011 NBA lockout. For years there’s been stories and claims that Kentucky’s 2012 National Championship team beat an NBA All-Star mashup team of LeBron, Durant, Westbrook, Harden, and others in a secret scrimmage during the NBA lockout.

I wanted to see if I could find and piece together the most accurate account of what actually happened during those practices and workouts in 2011.

Allegedly, the reason this was never majorly reported on and why there is so little firsthand information about what happened in these workouts and scrimmages is that local media was told to STFU and/or signed NDAs if they were in attendance. It also was pretty heavily implied to those that covered Kentucky basketball that having all these NBA players practicing and scrimmaging against Kentucky’s college players would work wonders for their development, so reporting on it as it happened would only hurt the team and bring an immediate end to these sessions. From what I can tell, it wasn’t until 2024 that a Kentucky player officially acknowledged what happened and gave details.

Backstory -

When the 2011 NBA lockout occurred, then Kentucky coach John Calipari opened Kentucky’s practice facilities to every former Kentucky player in the NBA. This led to players like John Wall, DeMarcus Cousins, Tayshaun Prince, Brandon Knight, Nazr Mohammed, Eric Bledsoe, Rajon Rondo, and many more to return to Lexington.

Due to NBA lockout rules, NBA players were not allowed to use NBA-owned facilities or communicate/organize with NBA coaches or training staffs. This led to coach Calipari opening Kentucky’s practice facilities, which were comparable if not equal to most NBA facilities at the time, as well as access to Kentucky’s trainers and coaching staff, to any NBA player.

Because of coach Calipari’s connections and the lockout rules, this led to players like LeBron James, Kevin Durant, Russell Westbrook, James Harden, and many others to flock to Lexington to take part in these practices, scrimmages, and training sessions. This also led to many, if not all players from the Oklahoma City Thunder and allegedly the Boston Celtics to also hold voluntary workouts/scrimmages in Lexington during the lockout.

While it’s pretty commonly reported that the Thunder as a team were in Lexington, the only solid report I can find that says the Boston Celtics were in Lexington is from a brief article from the KYKernel, citing a tweet from former Kentucky QB and then grad assistant coach Andre Woodson that said the Thunder and Celtics were both practicing in Lexington. In the article, it also says he tweeted that Derrick Rose would be coming to Lexington later in the week as well.

There are also multiple people that claim that Dwight Howard, Dwyane Wade, Tyson Chandler, Chris Paul, Blake Griffin, and multiple other members of the Clippers roster and Heat roster were in Lexington at some point or another, though most say it was only for a day or two which is why they are not mentioned or verified as being there unlike LeBron, Durant, Westbrook, Harden, etc who were there for multiple weeks.

Firsthand accounts from then-Kentucky point guard Marquis Teague and shooting guard Doron Lamb from a radio interview in 2024

While reminiscing, Teague confirmed one of KSR’s favorite stories from the 2011-12 season: that he and his Kentucky teammates beat a team of NBA stars in a scrimmage on UK’s campus in the fall of 2011. There were many NBA players in Lexington to train during the 2011 NBA lockout, including most of the 2011-12 Oklahoma City Thunder (Kevin Durant, James Harden, Russell Westbrook, Kendrick Perkins, Nazr Mohammed, and others), LeBron James, Rajon Rondo, Eric Bledsoe, and more.

As the story goes, Kentucky’s top six players that championship season–Teague, Lamb, Michael-Kidd Gilchrist, Terrence Jones, Anthony Davis, and Darius Miller–scrimmaged a team of the NBA pros, and the first game went to the Wildcats.

“We won,” Teague confirmed to KSR on Thursday, adding, “Actually, they had LeBron James playing, KD, all those guys… We were big-time players in his high school, so in our minds, we could compete against anybody. Didn’t really matter to us.”

The second part of that story, and the reason why it’s a KSR favorite, is we heard at the time that, after the young Wildcats won the first scrimmage, Teague yelled toward the NBA stars, “This is Kentucky, we don’t give no f****!”

Teague confirmed that part, too.

Doron Lamb also mentioned in the interview that NBA player Josh Smith was present in Lexington for the workouts.

From the interview, Marquis Teague confirms the rumor that the Kentucky college team scrimmaged an NBA lineup consisting of Westbrook, Harden, Durant, another OKC player (allegedly Kendrick Perkins or Serge Ibaka), and LeBron James.

While it isn’t stated in the interview and has never officially been said, other Kentucky reporters from that time have offhandedly mentioned on radio broadcasts and message boards over the years that once the Kentucky team won the first matchup, that the NBA players “locked in” and allegedly blew Kentucky out of the water and may have won by as much as 40 in the second matchup.

Another article with quotes from Anthony Davis, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist, and Terrence Jones

Not many people stop LeBron James. So when Anthony Davis said he, Michael Kidd-Gilchrist and Terrence Jones, who switched off turns trying to stop a man who NBA defenders have trouble guarding, “kind of” stopped James when he swung through UK to play pickup with the players, that’s pretty impressive.

Regarding Anthony Davis

The plethora of NBA stars who stopped by Lexington as the lockout continues benefited UK in a variety of ways. For Davis, who admits he is uncomfortable down low, to learn some low-post moves from the best. “I’ve been working out with DeMarcus (Cousins) and Nazr (Mohammed),” Davis said. “They’re showing me some new shots, post moves.”

Regarding Marquis Teague

Freshman point guard Marquis Teague reiterated the same thought, as he went up against the likes of Rajon Rondo of the Boston Celtics and Russell Westbrook of the Oklahoma City Thunder. “Rondo’s more of a true point guard. He doesn’t score a lot, but he can score if he needs to,” Teague said, whose brother Jeff plays for the Atlanta Hawks. “Russell Westbrook is coming at you every time. He’s not backing off at all, not easing up. He’s trying to dunk it on you or score on you every single play.”

Regarding Terrence Jones

Terrence Jones said UK competed hard against the NBA players and largely held their own, although he hedged how much could be taken from that. “It’s hard to really say,” Jones said. “It’s hard to compare them in an open gym against what they really play like in the NBA.”

Takeaways

While it’s not much, this seems to be the most complete (while still being absolutely incomplete) story of how for a couple weeks in 2011 during the lockout, Kentucky basketball and their facilities became the center of the NBA world.

It seems pretty wild that LeBron seemingly worked out with the Oklahoma City Thunder during the lockout for a few weeks, as the Heat and Thunder would eventually face off in the championship in the lockout-shortened season.

Kentucky players seemed to benefit as well, as that team later won the NCAA championship.

Purely speculation on my part, but this may have also been why Anthony Davis was the first player since Christian Laettner in 1992 to make the USA Olympic Basketball team before playing a single game in the NBA. Scrimmaging and practicing against LeBron, Durant, Westbrook, Harden, and potentially Tyson Chandler and Chris Paul, meant he had already gone against potentially half of the Olympic team who would know his abilities.

Sadly, a lot of details from over the years are lost to the archives of radio shows and random articles from dead fan-sites that would take thousands of hours to find and transcribe, if they even still exist to begin with, which is why there are so many mixed accounts and stories from fans and reporters over the years.

The tl;dr seems to be that during the 2011 NBA lockout a ton of NBA players practiced and scrimmaged in Lexington alongside the Kentucky college team, and at some point scrimmaged each other. Kentucky scrimmaged and beat a team consisting of LeBron, Durant, Westbrook, Harden, and someone else, trash talked, and then the NBA players took things serious and beat the absolute fuck out of them in the next game.