Through Oct. 31, Sports Illustrated will count down its preseason college basketball Top 25 with overviews of each team. Here are the full rankings so far.
It can simultaneously be true that Tony Bennett built one of the best programs in college basketball at Virginia and that whenever he left, a pretty significant modernization process would likely be needed. Tasked with that job is Ryan Odom (coincidentally the man who delivered Virginia its most crushing loss to UMBC in the 2018 NCAA tournament), a proven winner at all three of his Division I head coaching stops. Odom’s a coach who has proven adaptable stylistically to the strengths of each job he has had, and as someone who grew up in the ACC seems like a natural fit in Charlottesville, Va. He revved up Virginia’s NIL machine immediately, hitting the ground running armed with a strong budget that has helped him build an impressive Year 1 roster. It’s an entirely new group, but the upside is sky-high.
