Ryan Hampton helps lead Nightrydas to unlikely comeback win at Peach Jam, advances to semifinals

Ryan Hampton has already said he wants to help lead Kentucky to a national championship when he gets to Lexington. Now, the future Wildcat is putting his money where his mouth is at the AAU level, doing the same for his Nightrydas squad at the Nike EYBL Peach Jam, advancing to the event semifinals. Now, it wasn’t the prettiest performance in the world, but you do what you gotta do when you find yourself down by as many as 16 points with 3:36 to go in the third quarter and trail by double digits from the first quarter. Nightrydas shot just 35 percent from the field and 18 percent from three, but got the job done with a 55-54 win over AB Elite, thanks to a go-ahead game-winner with 15 seconds to go by Vanderbilt commit Gabe Nesmith. He scored a team-high 16 points on 4-9 shooting and 7-7 at the line, followed by a monster all-around performance for Kentucky target Lewis Uvwo, who finished with 14 points (6-15 FG), 16 rebounds, five blocks and an assist in 30 minutes. He’s the best shot-blocking talent I’ve seen with my own two eyes since Nerlens Noel, altering just about everything thrown up at the rim if he can’t get his hands on it. As for Hampton, he scored six points on a tough 2-11 shooting overall — although he got downhill and found himself with impressive opportunities at the rim, only to roll out and be stuffed in by a teammate for the putback. That happened on three straight attempts at one point, doing his job getting the ball up on the glass for Uvwo, typically, to clean up. He also added five rebounds, two assists and a steal with just one turnover in 28 minutes — second-most on the team. He also chipped in on the team defensive effort on UK target Beckham Black, whose tired legs finally caught up to him after back-to-back-to-back trips to Turkey (FIBA U17s), Vegas (EYBL) and North Augusta (Peach Jam) in consecutive weeks. It was his worst performance at Peach Jam to get knocked out of the tournament, but still managed to have 15 points (6-19 FG, 1-8 3PT), four assists, two rebounds, two steals in the loss. Instead, it’ll be a future Cat surviving and advancing at Riverview Park Activities Center. Kentucky commit Ryan Hampton helps lead Nightrydas to a MASSIVE comeback win vs. Beckham Black and AB EliteUK target Lewis Uvwo was a monster — 14 PTS, 16 REB, 5 BLK (but altered about a dozen more)Black limited to 15 PTS (6-19 FG, 1-8 3PT)Thriller! pic.twitter.com/ZAEoqG6KUp— Jack Pilgrim (@JackPilgrimKSR) July 18, 2026 Up next? The final four, set to take on Drive Nation at 7:30 p.m. ET for a spot in the championship. The other semifinal battle will be between Cayden Daughtry’s Florida Rebels and Team Herro — Tyler Herro’s sponsored AAU team — at 6 p.m. ET. Time to see if Hampton can finish the job in North Augusta. He’s been impressive in the event up to this point and just had his first bad shooting performance, so he’s due for a bounce-back this evening. Get it done for BBN.