5 early lessons of men’s basketball season: Real vs. pretend contenders, more

It’s been 37 days since the men’s college basketball season began – and what a wild start it has been.

The rookie class quickly emerged as one of the best in the history of the game. The group is so good that Washington’s hannes steinbachAveraging 18.5 points and 12.8 rebounds, projected as the 21st pick in ESPN’s 2026 NBA Mock Draft,

The early stages have also helped to identify which preseason contenders are real threats to win the national championship – see: michigan Defeated fellow AP top-10 team gonzaga By 40 points during gala week – and those who look more like pretentious ones.

Amidst all the turmoil, it’s clear that this season is producing some of the best basketball of this era. The top teams are really good. The talent pool is deep. The coaching is top notch. And the atmosphere has been amazing (this is not an invitation to boast about the Players Era Festival crowds).

We’re headed for an incredible Final Four finish in Indianapolis after a decade villanovaChris Jenkins hits the winning 3-pointer at the buzzer to beat North Carolina At the 2016 National Championships. If the first month is any indicator, the 2025-26 season could end with similar fireworks.

Here are the five biggest lessons we’ve learned so far.

This freshman class could be the best of the one-and-done era

Over four seasons between 2021–22 and 2024–25, kenpomFour new players were included in the final Player of the Year rankings: Chet Holmgren And paolo banchero In 2022, Brandon Miller and in 2023 cooper flag In 2025. The same number of new players are included in this season’s ranking.

that list starts cameron boozer, rulerStarr has a higher offensive rating on KenPom than Flagg or zion williamsonThe last two National Player of the Year winners produced by the Blue Devils concluded their award-winning seasons. During the first five weeks, at least, Boozer has separated himself from the field With a breathtaking effort for the undefeated Duke team.

At Boozer’s Heels is a collection of outstanding first-year students who deserve the same recognition.

BYU‘S AJ DiBantsa He has been arguably the second best player in the country and a North Carolina star Caleb Wilson Leading a resurgence in Chapel Hill. Work is underway on the same bounce-back kansas Now, even with the projected No. 1 NBA draft pick darrin petersonReturned from a month’s absence due to a hamstring injury.

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AJ DiBantsa jams the exclamation mark for BYU

AJ DiBantsa drives the open lane to the basket and creates a huge jam for BYU.

Each of the top eight picks in ESPN’s 2026 NBA mock draft are rookies — a group that doesn’t even include rising prospects like houston‘S Kingston Flemings Or arkansas, Darius Acuff Jr.,

In a one-and-done era, this team has a chance to become the best we have ever seen.

Florida, Kentucky and St. John’s failed to meet expectations

Three days after suffering its worst scoring drought of the last eight years – last week’s 10-minute, 25-second loss to North Carolina – kentucky Missed its first 10 shots and lost to Gonzaga by 35 points on Friday in Nashville. To say that the ninth-ranked team in the preseason AP Top 25 is in trouble would be a gross understatement. The Wildcats are a mess, but they’re not the only preseason contender looking for answers.

Months after winning a national title with a group of elite guards, Floridatoad golden Rebooted your backcourt with former arkansas star Boogie Land And princeton transfer xavien leeIt hasn’t worked out as planned, In Florida’s two-player lineups – an on-court metric on EvanMiya,com that reflects how teams perform when specific players are paired together – the Fland-Lee combination ranks 26th on its own team, And although Lee scored 19 points against Yukon In Tuesday’s game at Madison Square Garden, that loss was another example of the Gators’ limitations when Lee and Fland (1 of 9 from 3 against the Huskies) weren’t equally elite on the same night.

Ultimately, despite this, Florida doesn’t look like the defending champions so far thomas hoff (18.6 ppg, 7.6 rpg, 2.8 apg) is playing like an All-American.

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Thomas Haw flies to Florida for a stormy alley-oop jam

Xavien Lee passed the ball to Thomas Hough for a historic 1-and-1 alley-oop slam for Florida vs. UConn.

and defending Big East champions, after finishing second in adjusted defensive efficiency st johns According to BartTorvik.com, he ranks 51st in the same category since November 24. Rick Pitino signed some top transfers in the portal, but he failed to build the same defensive integrity that had helped his squad earn an invitation to “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” a year earlier. The Red Storm have already lost three games after finishing last season with only five losses.

Michigan, Iowa State and Arizona are better than we expected

After being bombarded with questions by his colleagues at Big 12 media day, ArizonaTommy Lloyd of Kansas City, Missouri sat on stage and at the same time acknowledged the lack of interest in his team. “No other questions? Really?” Lloyd said. “Ok.”

Since that moment in October, Arizona has shocked college basketball. The Wildcats earned their first No. 1 ranking in the AP Top 25 since 2023 this week thanks to early wins over No. 5 UConn, No. 18 Florida, No. 21 Florida, and No. 21 Florida. golden brown color and number 25 UCLAsensational freshman koa peat (15.9 ppg, 5.5 rpg) leads a team that is averaging 88.5 points.

Two teams that were not viewed as serious preseason contenders have also managed to earn national praise over the first month.

Michigan beats Gonzaga by 40 points in Las Vegas during Fest Week, moves to 3-0 with win at Players Era Festival san diego state And Auburn too. Led by All-America Candidate Yaxel LendeborgThe Wolverines have the best defense in the country And Six games were won by 25 or more points.

joshua jefferson (17.6 ppg, 6.7 rpg, 5.4 apg) and iowa state They also have key wins on their resume, including a true 23-point victory last Saturday over then-No. 1 PurdueThis is the best win so far this season, The Cyclones have also managed to force turnovers on 26,5% of their opponents’ possessions, which is the best mark in the country,

All three teams finished outside the top six in the preseason AP Poll – Arizona (13th) and Iowa State (16th) weren’t even in the top 10. But those three teams have looked like serious national championship contenders through the first month of the season.

3-point revolution reaches record high

In George Washingtonwon 84-70 Army On December 2, both teams combined to shoot 70 3-pointers. In the 2015 national title game, wisconsin And Duke shot a combined 32 3s — or seven fewer than Army shot last week.

While the importance of the 3-point shot is not a new phenomenon in college basketball, the surge in the first month of the 2025-26 season suggests we could see a flood of 3-pointers at an unmatched rate. According to KenPom, a then-record 121 teams took 3-pointers on at least 40% of their shots in 2021-22, up from 103 teams in the same category five years ago. Last season the number increased again to an astonishing 157 teams.

So far this season, at least 40% of total field goal attempts for 187 teams – more than half of Division I programs – have been 3-pointers.

The game is rapidly evolving in real time, and the first month has proven as much with a rush of 3-point attempts all over the landscape.

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Alex Karban loses first 3 runs for UConn

Alex Karban loses first 3 runs for UConn

ACC… is back?

The ACC sent a North Carolina team that finished 13–7 in conference play as the fourth and final NCAA Tournament entry after finishing with only four bids for the first time in more than a decade.

Needless to say, the last few seasons have been a decline for the ACC, but the conference has already begun to erase its recent troubles. Yes, Duke is Duke. Boozer is the front-runner for National Player of the Year and has a supporting cast around him that can help the Blue Devils win their first national title since 2015. This is not a new thing. However, what role other ACC teams can play in reviving the conference remains to be seen.

louisville ,mikel brown jr.) and North Carolina (Caleb Wilson) are led by a pair of projected lottery selections. First-year head coach Ryan Odom (Virginia), Jay Lucas (miami) and Will Wade (nc state) can change the situation for their teams this season. Overall, five ACC teams are ranked in the top 25 in adjusted offensive efficiency at the beginning of December.

This is a good sign.

The ACC finished last season with only five top 100 teams in KenPom’s final rankings. There have been nine in the conference so far this season. It also had eight sub-100 KenPom teams at the end of 2024-25, which is a better measuring stick for the overall strength (or lack thereof) of the conference. This season, there are only three ACC teams in the same division.

With a boost in talent and new faces, the ACC has already demonstrated that it is collectively poised for a better season than the last two seasons.