BensenJensen's Week Pre-Season Ballot
| Rank | Team | Reason |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Kansas | Returning talent and great transfers, very deep roster |
| 2 | Alabama | A lot of talent coming back, a good recruiting class and some solid transfers |
| 3 | Houston | Return almost everyone from a very good team, literally everyone but Shead and a couple bench guys |
| 4 | North Carolina | Davis returns, Tyson is a valuable transfer, the recruiting class was very good |
| 5 | Iowa State | A lot of contributors returning, they did very well in the transfer market |
| 6 | Duke | they lost a lot of talent but replaced them with a good transfer haul and an elite recruiting class |
| 7 | Tennessee | Really like the transfer haul, Lanier and Dubar are good scorers and Okpara is an elite defender |
| 8 | Baylor | Transfers and recruiting brought in a lot of talent, very good coach dedicated to the program |
| 9 | Gonzaga | A lot of contributors returning, Ajayi in the transfer market may be the best scorer available |
| 10 | UConn | Lost a lot, but deserve the benefit of the doubt after two titles in a row, Karaban should be an All-American and Mahaney in the transfer market brings in a very good scorer |
| 11 | Arizona | Dell'Orso and Townsend are instant contributors, |
| 12 | Auburn | Good transfer haul and recruiting class to go with returning contributors |
| 13 | Creighton | Kalkbrenner, landed Neal and Isaacs in the transfer market |
| 14 | Arkansas | Johnell Davis is Calipari's new John Wall? Probably not, but Cal brought some talent over |
| 15 | Texas A&M | Wade Taylor returns, solid transfer market haul, |
| 16 | Purdue | returned a solid core, losing Edey hurts but Painter is a very good coach |
| 17 | Indiana | brought a ton of talent in the transfer portal, Tucker is a great recruit, I think they surprise a lot of people this year |
| 18 | Texas | transfer haul might end up being the best in the country with Tre Johnson coming in as well |
| 19 | St. John's | Pitino brought in some talent |
| 20 | Miami (FL) | I really like the recruiting class and the transfer hauls, dark horse in the ACC |
| 21 | Rutgers | recruiting class deserves some hype, but they also brought a lot of talent in through transfers |
| 22 | Texas Tech | Returned a solid core and Toppin and Overton should be instant contributors |
| 23 | BYU | Kevin Young as a college coach is very scary, his coaching in Phoenix was stellar, solid core comes back |
| 24 | Michigan State | great recruiting class and Fidler in the transfers |
| 25 | UCLA | very deep returning roster with an elite transfer haul, this is a scary team if they click |
Overall Rationale
It's too early to rank on performance, obviously, so I like to use the returning players, the transfer market, and recruiting class to evaluate teams