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It isn’t typical for June and July to be overly busy months in the world of college basketball, but the hottest months of 2026 have given us a sharp jolt of surprise player defections, injuries, and a coaching move that no one in the basketball world could have seen coming.
With that being the case, it’s time to revisit our early rankings for the 2026-27 campaign and serve up a new midsummer top 25.
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1. Florida Gators
2025-26 Record: 27-8
2025-26 Finish: Second Round
With Rueben Chinyelu opting to spurn the NBA and return to school for one more year, Florida will return the same frontcourt that won a national title two seasons ago and earned a No. 1 seed in 2026. Bringing back point guard Boogie Fland — whose emergence in the second half of the season took the Gators from disappointment to legitimate national title contender — and reserve guard Urban Klavzar is enormous as well. Extremely capable two guard Denzel Aberdeen is also back after a season at Kentucky, but he’ll need a waiver to play in 2026-27, something Todd Golden seems confident Aberdeen will receive.
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With or without Aberdeen, this is the best roster in college basketball at this point in the offseason, and that seems unlikely to change between now and early November.
2. Illinois Fighting Illini
2025-26 Record: 28-9
2025-26 Finish: Final Four
Outside of star freshman guard Keaton Wagler, virtually every key contributor will be back from an Illinois team that took the program to its first Final Four since 2005. Andrej Stojaković gave the fan base a little bit of a scare before officially withdrawing from the NBA Draft on deadline day.
The addition of Providence transfer Stefan Vaaks should help alleviate the losses of Wagler and fellow guard Kylan Boswell. The big question for this team will be whether or not incoming freshman Quintin Coleman is good enough to replace Wagler and run the show. The Illini are going to be very good either way.
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3. Duke Blue Devils
2025-26…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/articles/four-months-until-ncaa-basketball-160045134.html
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Publish date : 2026-07-13 16:00:00
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