College Basketball Early Season Pretenders?

There are a few teams whose preseason rankings in some polls may have been a bit too high. We’re looking at KenPom rankings compared to where these teams were generally considered to be going into the year to find which ones may be a bit overrated. 

UCLA - This team had recently benched their typical starters in a move to try and improve their defensive prowess where they now rank 12th in terms of KenPom defense. The problem is they’re outside the top 50 in terms of KenPom offense sitting at 53rd. This would likely make it pretty difficult to make a run in March considering they’ll likely see teams top 10 in these rankings. 

Michigan St. - We saw this team have a huge win against Kentucky but also struggle against San Jose St. They currently rank 46th in terms of KenPom offense and 9th defensively. With their offense this low it could make it difficult to beat elite offenses a few weekends into March. 

Oregon - with the 86th ranked KenPom offense so far this season and a 1 point win against Hawaii, this team isn't off to the best offensive start as expected. They were a tournament team last season and were much higher in terms of their offensive efficiency where they had been 34th. With Jackson Shelstad fully back now we’ll see if they can improve these rankings. 

Arkansas - this team currently has the 47th ranked KenPom offense and 40th ranked defense, two marks that are not great for a team hoping to make another run come March 

North Carolina - with the 18th AP Poll ranking and KenPom ranked 37th offense, this team may find it difficult to compete with teams ranked in their range with much more distinguished offenses. Even with their 24th KenPom ranked defense they’ll likely want to improve offensively to avoid any early upset in a tournament scenario.