It's been six months since the Florida Gators won the national title and the runner-up Houston Cougars topped the first edition of these offseason top 25 rankings, with Purdue, Louisville, UConn and Michigan rounding out the top five. Now with just a couple of weeks left until the 2025-26 college basketball season tips off, only three of those teams retain a place among the top five.
Way-too-early rankings are considered something of a fool's errand in the modern era of college basketball, given the rampant rebuilds and roster overhauls each offseason. But with big programs getting their business done earlier in the transfer portal cycle, and most non-first-rounders returning to college instead of leaving early for the NBA draft, many of the projected high-end rotations didn't change much between April and October.