LOUISVILLE, Ky. — They all wanted a picture with Jeff Sheppard.
As the Most Outstanding Player of the 1998 NCAA tournament shuffled toward the KFC YUM! Center for his alma mater’s matchup at Louisville, dozens of Kentucky fans pulled him aside and held up their phones.
“Hey, look at that, son!” one father told his child after he snapped a selfie. “You just took a picture with Reed Sheppard‘s dad!”
Jeff is one of the program’s most popular former players. But his son is now the biggest star of Kentucky basketball’s royal family — which also includes his mother, former Kentucky women’s basketball star Stacey Reed Sheppard, who is No. 2 in career steals (309) for the Wildcats and a 1994 All-SEC first-teamer.
When your father is a two-time national champion and your mother is one of the greatest women’s players of all time, it is not easy to write your own story. This season, however, Sheppard has found a way to do just that.
Despite coming off the bench, Sheppard’s efficiency and production — 12.6 points, 4.5 assists and 2.5 steals per game, 54.1% shooting from the 3-point line — have made him key to Kentucky’s aim to…
