Flory Bidunga averaged 13.3 points and 9.0 rebounds per game at Kansas last season as a sophomore. His low post dominance made him a coveted portal asset, leading the Big 12 in both blocked shots and field goal percentage.
UConn's +1266 scoring differential (outscoring opponents by 38.3 points per game) is a result of scoring 88.7 points per game (second in college basketball) while giving up 50.4 per outing (first in college basketball).
St. John's and Connecticut, the top two seeds, are heavily favored to meet in Saturday's championship game. They are the only Big East schools ranked in the Associated Press top 25 poll: UConn is sixth and St. John's is 13th. Both are locks for the NCAA tournament, as is Villanova, the No. 3 seed.
They looked every bit like the nation's best defensive team, keeping the Wolverines off the offensive glass and out of transition. And while the Blue Devils don't look as explosive on the offensive end as some of the other top teams, they sandwiched that Michigan win with two games against Syracuse and Notre Dame in which they scored 201 total points.
The Seton Hall Pirates (14-6, 4-5 Big East) will look to break a four-game losing streak when they host the Xavier Musketeers (11-9, 3-6 Big East) on January 28, 2026 at Prudential Center. In its most recent game, Seton Hall lost to DePaul on Saturday, 67-60. Its top scorer was Adam Clark with 14 points. In its previous game, Xavier fell to St. John's on Saturday, 88-83. Its high scorer was Tre Carroll with 31 points.
Through the first half of last season, Illinois looked like a legitimate Final Four contender. The Fighting Illini started 12-3, with wins over Wisconsin, Missouri, Oregon and Arkansas. But they would go 5-8 in their next 13 games, proving to be something of a paper tiger. In games against Quad 4 opponents, they had the best defensive rating in the country at CBB Analytics. In Quad 1 games, they were 82nd.
Before this season tipped off, it would have seemed equally unlikely that this late-January edition of Power Rankings would feature Nebraska in the top five or Miami (Ohio) at all. And yet, that's where things stand after two of the three remaining unbeatens survived another week without a loss. Looking purely at efficiency-based metrics, which tend to be more predictive than résumé-based metrics, neither team fits the bill on paper.