Kenny Payne scores visit from 5-star recruit Karter Knox amid questions about his future

The most prevalent topic of conversation surrounding the Louisville men's basketball team in the wake of Wednesday's embarrassing loss to Arkansas State and Koron Davis' dismissal from the program has been when, not if, second-year head coach Kenny Payne will lose his job.

Payne has since secured an official visit from five-star 2024 recruit Karter Knox.

Knox's father, Kevin Knox Sr., told The Courier Journal on Friday at least he and his youngest son will arrive in town Saturday morning. They plan to attend the Cardinals' game at 2 p.m. Sunday against Pepperdine at the KFC Yum! Center.

In a video posted to X, formerly Twitter, on Friday night by The Athletic's Kyle Tucker, Knox told reporters after his game in the Atlanta-based Overtime Elite league he is looking forward to exploring Louisville, that the visit was not scheduled at the last minute but the state of the program gave him some pause about following through on it and that, if he were to choose U of L as his college destination, he could potentially help turn things around.

He did, however, decline to comment when asked by Cameron Drummond of The Lexington Herald-Leader if he would still consider the Cards if Payne was not their head coach.

Knox's oldest brother, Kevin Knox Jr., was a one-and-done player for John Calipari at Kentucky. Payne, a former assistant on Calipari's staff, played a key role in getting him to Lexington and coached him from 2020-22 during a stint on Tom Thibodeau's New York Knicks staff.

Knox, a Tampa, Florida, native, is down to four options for the next step on his quest to follow in his oldest brother's footsteps as an NBA lottery pick.

They are: Louisville, UK, his hometown school, South Florida, and NBA G League Ignite.

"(Payne) definitely wants to have that opportunity to coach Karter," Knox Sr. told The Courier Journal this summer at Nike's EYBL Peach Jam. "I think he could really help out the University of Louisville, and it could be a two-way street. "(It's a) great basketball community, and that’s something he's recruiting against an hour up the road at Kentucky."

Knox has not visited Lexington since attending Big Blue Madness last year. Calipari and members of his staff reportedly made a trip to Atlanta in September to check in with him at Overtime Elite — and again Friday night before the No. 15 Wildcats play No. 9 North Carolina on Saturday at State Farm Arena.

Less than 24 hours before the news of Knox's visit broke, college hoops insider Jeff Goodman reported Louisville athletics director Josh Heird planned to make a decision "fairly soon" regarding Payne's future with the program.

Heird, Goodman wrote on X, spent Thursday meeting with multiple players to get their thoughts on Payne and where the team stands 10 games into its 2023-24 season "before making a decision."

On Friday, CBS Sports' Matt Norlander reported Payne is "unlikely to be fired" before Sunday's game but said "the expectation is that will happen sooner rather than later" and that Heird "will not drag this out over the course of the entire season."

Another insider, who operates incognito on X under the pseudonym Trilly Donovan, reported Friday that Heird is still trying to find an interim coach "willing to do the job." Associate head coach Danny Manning, he wrote, "has turned down the opportunity;" while assistant Nolan Smith "is still considering it.

"External hires are also in play," Donovan added, "with former Louisville assistant Mark Lieberman being the most talked about of those candidates."

Lieberman, who served on Hall of Famer Rick Pitino's staff from 2010-12, coached a team of primarily ex-Cards in The Basketball Tournament over the summer.

U of L enters Sunday's matchup against Pepperdine with a record of 4-6 (0-1 ACC). As of Friday evening, it was third to last among high-major schools on KenPom.com's adjusted efficiency rankings, coming in at 205th out of 362 Division I programs.

Knox, a 6-foot-6, 219-pound wing, ranks 12th in the 2024 cycle on the 247Sports Composite. Across four games in Overtime Elite, he's averaging 25.3 points on 44% shooting (29.4% from 3) with seven rebounds and 1.8 assists per contest.

Prior to Knox's official visit, the Cards' recruiting efforts in the Class of 2024 had slowed to a snail's pace — at least from the outside looking in.

Their lone commitment of the cycle, three-star point guard TJ Robinson, did not ink his national letter of intent during college basketball's early signing period in November. And, as it stood Friday, they had scholarship offers out to only two players who have not eliminated them from contention, forwards Bryson Tucker and Sekou Konneh.

Reach Louisville men's basketball reporter Brooks Holton at bholton@gannett.com and follow him on X at @brooksHolton.

This article originally appeared on Louisville Courier Journal: Louisville basketball: Karter Knox to visit with Kenny Payne Saturday