Despite landing at No. 10 in the Associated Press Top 25 preseason poll Monday, the Arizona Wildcats were only the fifth-highest-ranked team from their new conference.
That’s how tough the Big 12 race is expected to be this season.
Perennial Big 12 power Kansas was ranked No. 1 and received half of the AP’s 60 first-place votes, while Houston was picked to finish fourth during its second year as a Big 12 member. Of other Big 12 schools, Iowa State was picked fifth, Baylor eighth and Cincinnati 20th. Texas Tech, Kansas State, BYU and ASU also received votes.
College basketball’s analytics experts see the Big 12 race playing out similarly, too. Ken Pomeroy, Evan Miyakawa and Bart Torvik all had Arizona as the Big 12’s fourth-highest-rated team, slightly above Baylor, and their rankings suggested that virtually any Big 12 game could be competitive.
Pomeroy’s site, Kenpom.com, ranked Houston No. 1 and Arizona No. 8 while putting eight Big 12 teams in its top 25 — and the entire 16-team conference in the top 90.
Arizona head coach Tommy Lloyd chats with his players during a preseason practice Friday inside Richard Jefferson Gymnasium on the UA campus. Lloyd’s Wildcats will start the season ranked 10th nationally, according to the preseason Associated Press poll. But even in the Top 10, Arizona is just the fifth-highest team from the Big 12 alone, trailing preseason No. 1 Kansas, No. 4 Houston, No. 5 Iowa State and No. 8 Baylor.
On Evanmiya.com, Houston ranked first and Arizona was ranked seventh, while seven Big 12 teams ranked in the top 16 and Colorado was the lowest-rated at No. 107. Barttorvik.com also placed Houston first and Arizona 10th, with nine Big 12 teams among the top 30.
Asked at his preseason news conference if he altered his roster construction for the Big 12 competition ahead, UA coach Tommy Lloyd indicated confidence that the Wildcats were ready.
“Obviously we’re stepping into a conference that’s known for not only great competition, but great athletes and great physicality,” Lloyd said. “I think we’re built for it. But we’re not going to make any assumptions. We’ve got to go out and prove that we’re built to be successful in the Big 12.”
They’ll find out soon enough. After playing at Wisconsin, hosting seventh-ranked Duke and participating in the well-regarded Battle 4 Atlantis next month, the Wildcats will face No. 22 UCLA on Dec. 14 in Phoenix, then close out nonconference play and open their Big 12 schedule by hosting TCU on Dec. 30 at McKale Center.
Arizona guard Caleb Love (1) looks to pass the ball during a recent preseason Wildcats practice Friday inside Richard Jefferson Gymnasium on the UA campus. Love, the reigning Pac-12 Player of the Year, was named a preseason first-team All-Big 12 selection last week, coinciding with the Wildcats’ first year in what is widely considered the best college basketball conference in the country.
Then they’ll play their first Big 12 away game at No. 20 Cincinnati on Jan. 4, and go on to also play at West Virginia, Texas Tech and Oklahoma State over the first three weeks of January.
The back end of the Wildcats’ schedule might be even tougher: They’ll play at No. 5 Iowa State on March 1, host ASU in a potentially emotional home finale at 9 p.m. on Tuesday, March 4 — then hop back on a charter airplane to face the top-rated Jayhawks at Lawrence, Kansas on March 8 in the regular-season finale.
The Big 12 Tournament will begin in nearby Kansas City just three days after the UA-KU game, though UA could receive a bye or multiple byes based on how it finishes league play.
The Jayhawks received 30 first-place votes in AP preseason media voting. No. 2 Alabama picked up 14, defending national champ UConn picked up 11, Houston received four and Gonzaga was given one.
Gonzaga, ranking sixth overall, and UCLA were the only other schools west of the Rockies to land in the AP Top 25. The Wildcats could meet Gonzaga or Indiana, which was ranked No. 17, on the final day of the Battle 4 Atlantis competition.
Arizona head coach Tommy Lloyd works with his players during a preseason practice inside Richard Jefferson Gymnasium Friday on the UA campus.
Although coaches often downplay the significance of AP preseason rankings, Pomeroy still has a 2010 column posted in which he says he’s a “big fan of the AP preseason poll” because it can be a more accurate view of teams’ strengths. Weekly AP Top 25 polls are designed to reflect teams’ performance to date.
“With the voters having to use their hoops expertise as opposed to adhering to certain conventions (during the season), you end up with an accurate picture of which teams are truly the best,” Pomeroy wrote.
Last season, Arizona’s preseason ranking proved especially accurate.
The Wildcats were picked No. 12 in the AP preseason poll last October, rose to No. 1 in December, then entered the NCAA Tournament at No. 9 after winning the Pac-12 regular-season title but losing in the conference tournament semifinals. Then they finished at exactly No. 12 in the AP postseason poll after losing to Clemson in the Sweet 16.
Arizona, which was picked to finish fifth in the Big 12 coaches poll last week, returns just one starter from last season’s Pac-12 regular-season champions, but that one starter is guard Caleb Love, the Pac-12 Player of the Year last season.
The nonconference schedule for the Arizona men's basketball team for 2024-25, with times and TV stations.
UA also is elevating three key reserves from last season’s team — Jaden Bradley, KJ Lewis and Motiejus Krivas — while having pulled in three impact players from the transfer portal: Post player Tobe Awaka (Tennessee), forward Trey Townsend (Oakland) and wing Anthony Dell’Orso (Campbell).
