Why Kentucky might never be ranked as a Top 25 team during the 2026-27 preseason
The transfer portal has opened and closed.
Kentucky still isn’t regarded as a Top 25 team for the 2026-27 college basketball season.
And it might stay that way until the real games begin in November.
As Mark Pope continues to fill out his roster for Year 3 at UK, the possibilities for a high-profile addition — the type of player who could move the needle nationally — are dwindling. And if Pope can’t close on one of those big names, it’s looking like a real possibility that the Cats will roll into the 2026-27 season as an unranked team.
That would be nearly unprecedented in the modern era of Kentucky basketball.
Before getting into the numbers, an important caveat to what comes next:
One major commitment could flip the narrative here.
If Pope were to land No. 1 high school recruit Tyran Stokes or any of a trio of top-ranked portal players — namely Milan Momcilovic, Allen Graves and Tounde Yessoufou — it would likely be enough to garner a Top 25 preseason ranking, with intriguing talents like Zoom Diallo, Alex Wilkins, Kam Williams, Malachi Moreno and Braydon Hawthorne already on the roster and more rotation pieces coming soon.
If he can get more than one player from that list of undecideds (a long shot, but not an impossibility), Pope’s squad could be viewed as a legitimate Final Four contender.
But as of Friday morning — and keeping in mind that things change quickly this time of year — it would be difficult to call Kentucky the favorite for anyone in that group. And if Pope goes 0 for 4, he’d most likely be filling out his roster with lesser-known international players and lowly ranked transfers.
That could still be a recipe for on-court success if UK’s staff can find the right combination, but additions that haven’t fully proved themselves at the college level — or shown enough promise to be considered can’t-miss prospects — won’t do much to convince the national analysts to add the Cats to their preseason Top 25 rankings.
And right now, Kentucky is missing from all of those rundowns.
The latest Top 25 list from CBS Sports doesn’t include the Cats, who were also absent from the updated preseason rankings posted by On3.com and Field of 68 this week.
College basketball analyst Jon Rothstein’s running list of the top 45 teams for the 2026-27 season does include Kentucky … at No. 38, one spot ahead of Kansas, the other blue blood whose roster is on hold as the Stokes sweepstakes continues with no clear timetable for a resolution.
What college basketball pundits are thinking in April and May has no bearing on what will happen when the real games begin. To be unranked in November doesn’t end a team’s chances of making a deep run in March, obviously, but the optics of that would be bad for Pope as he enters what could be a pivotal third year on the job.
No Kentucky in the preseason rankings would also be a major departure from the norm.
The last time UK was not ranked in the Associated Press preseason Top 25 poll was 2008, which turned out to be Billy Gillispie’s final season as the program’s head coach.
Other than that, the Cats have been ranked in every preseason AP poll since the 1990-91 season, which was Rick Pitino’s second in charge. UK was still under NCAA probation that season (and managed to finish at No. 9 in the final AP poll).
Kentucky almost missed the cut in Pope’s first year, when he was forced to build an entire roster on the fly after taking over for John Calipari and ended up at No. 23 in the preseason rankings. That group — lacking in big names but deep with intriguing players — worked its way into the AP top five by early December before injuries piled up. Those Cats still managed a 3 seed in the NCAA Tournament and the No. 12 spot in the final AP rankings.
With a vocal segment of the UK fan base already on edge this offseason, an entire summer spent outside the national Top 25 wouldn’t be much fun for Pope. If he misses on Stokes and those top remaining transfers, there probably isn’t enough established talent out there to avoid such a scenario.
Early Top 25 rankings
Some quick observations on these early Top 25 rankings, which will continue to evolve in the coming weeks:
- Florida is the consensus No. 1 team in the country at the moment, with Todd Golden looking likely to return Thomas Haugh, Alex Condon, Rueben Chinyelu, Boogie Fland and Urban Klavzar from last season’s team — a master stroke of retention — along with the potential addition of Denzel Aberdeen, who announced he’ll be transferring back to Gainesville after spending a year at Kentucky. Aberdeen will need an NCAA waiver or a change to the current eligibility rules to play next season, but recent proposals on that front have led to optimism that he will indeed be allowed to suit up for the Gators again. Even if Aberdeen doesn’t get cleared, Florida will be stacked next season.
- There’s also a consensus forming on the group ranked just behind the Gators, with Duke, Illinois, Michigan and UConn all widely viewed as teams in the top-five conversation. Each of those teams, like Florida, has managed to retain key players from their successful 2025-26 rosters while also making some splashy additions via the transfer portal. Arizona, Houston and Michigan State are all viewed as consensus top-10 teams in the preseason.
- Florida is almost certain to once again be the SEC preseason favorite — the Gators topped that poll last fall and ended up winning the league — but the conference is filled with intriguing programs. Arkansas is the No. 2 SEC team on the CBS list. Calipari is expected to bring back Meleek Thomas and Billy Richmond, with incoming five-star recruits Jordan Smith Jr. and JJ Andrews joining a group of transfers that will include ex-Georgia guard Jeremiah Wilkinson and others. Texas, which cleaned up in the portal, is also in the top-10 conversation nationally. Alabama, Tennessee and Vanderbilt are in the early CBS rankings, with Missouri in the Top 25 mix, too.
- Louisville has the No. 1 transfer class in the country, according to the 247Sports rankings, but Pat Kelsey’s program lost quite a bit of talent to the portal, too — along with outgoing NBA draft hopeful Mikel Brown Jr., among other key players — so the Cardinals’ spring haul hasn’t coincided with a jump to true national contender territory. Still, Kentucky’s rivals are in a much better spot nationally, according to the preseason pundits. U of L is 13th in the Field of 68 rankings and No. 20 on the CBS Sports list. Kelsey is also still adding to a transfer class that already includes center Flory Bidunga (No. 1 in the 247Sports rankings), point guard Jackson Shelstad (No. 18), wing Karter Knox (No. 60) and forward Alvaro Folgueiras (No. 66).
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This story was originally published April 24, 2026 at 6:10 AM.
