After an offseason of high-profile coaching changes, record-setting NIL deals and endless eligibility chaos, college basketball is, at last, back. Twenty of the teams in the men’s AP Top 25 were in action on Monday night, including a pair of marquee games pitting ranked opponents against one-another.
Which teams pulled off opening night surprises? Which suffered ominous losses? Here are some season-opening snap judgments after a loaded night of hoops.
Snap judgment: UCLA is poised for a big season
On opening night last season, Arizona upset reigning national champion Florida to signal that the Wildcats had gone overlooked as a potential conference and national title contender.
A year later, 22nd-ranked UCLA pulled off a similar opening-night statement victory at Arizona’s expense.
An 84-75 UCLA win silenced a pro-Arizona crowd in Las Vegas and underscored that the Bruins should not be discounted as a potential Big Ten or Final Four contender. This is, at minimum, the most talented roster that Mick Cronin has assembled at UCLA since the Bruins won 31 games in 2023.
The backcourt duo of returnee Trent Perry and Texas Tech transfer Jaylen Petty combined for 34 points and 12 assists and showcased the ability to shoot, drive or dish. Power forward Eric Dailey bullied his way to 13 points. Veteran center Xavier Booker was effective at both ends of the floor, while 17-year-old phenom Nikola Kusturica and fellow freshman Joe Philon III both displayed flashes of upside.
To beat its old Pac-12 nemesis, UCLA had to weather game-long foul trouble and overcome Arizona’s three projected first-round picks. Promising wing Ivan Kharchenkov erupted for a career-high 38 points against the Bruins, but center Motiejus Krivas had a quiet eight points on four shots and heralded freshman Caleb Holt tallied just seven.
Krivas had the game’s costliest turnover with Arizona within two in the final minute, thinking he had a teammate open for a 3-pointer and instead whipping a pass to a Wildcats player standing up on the bench. UCLA then put the game away on the ensuing possession, Kusturica going long with his inbound pass and hitting Dailey in stride for a dunk.
At the same time that UCLA football is enjoying an undefeated season, UCLA men’s basketball could take an unbeaten record into December. The Bruins don’t play another Top 25 opponent until facing Gonzaga in Anaheim on December 5.
One thing is clear: Cronin likes this team.
As the notoriously cantankerous coach told CBS’ Allie LaForce after the game, “I’ve not had a bad day coaching this team, and I know that’s hard for everybody to believe.”
Snap judgment: This could be the beginning of the end for Porter Moser
Porter Moser has spent most of his Oklahoma tenure on the NCAA tourney bubble, contending for a bid in four of his five seasons but making the field just a single time.
A second NCAA tournament berth feels farther away than ever after the Sooners suffered one of the most stunning upset losses in recent memory.
Oklahoma lost at home against East Texas A&M in a game that mostly wasn’t even as close as its 68-64 final score. The cold-shooting, turnover-plagued Sooners trailed by nine at halftime and by 16 early in the second half before rallying to make the game competitive. Twice in the final five minutes, Oklahoma even managed to tie the score, but East Texas A&M answered to secure the program’s first-ever win over a power-conference opponent.
East Texas A&M is projected to finish dead last in the 12-team Southland Conference this season. The Lions closed as a 28.5-point underdog, making this the second largest Division I upset by spread over the past 30 years, per ESPN research. The only bigger upset came when Eastern Illinois beat Iowa in 2022 as a 30.5-point underdog.
This is a pivotal season for Moser after Oklahoma raised more NIL money for him to assemble a more competitive roster. The Sooners don’t have the tradition in men’s basketball that they do in football, but they’ve reached Final Fours three times with three different coaches in the past four decades.
Yes, Oklahoma was missing standout guard Xzayvier Brown on Monday night, but that’s no excuse for such a dreadful outcome. A fuming Moser acknowledged as much when he began his postgame news conference with an apology to Sooners fans.
“I apologize to every single person that came in,” Moser said. “The things you do in a game like this in basketball to get you beat, we did.”
Snap judgment: Penny Hardaway has a chance to coach his way off the hot seat …
Interest in University of Memphis basketball was already waning with the program stuck in a second-tier conference and nearly two decades removed from its most recent Sweet 16 run. Then the Tigers bottomed out with a 13-19 campaign last season, one that might have cost head coach Penny Hardaway his job were he not the program’s most beloved alumnus.
Hardaway overhauled his staff and restocked his roster with nine transfers this offseason, but as recently as last month the Tigers had sold fewer than 2,000 season tickets. They opened the season outside the top 75 in Ken Pomeroy’s efficiency rankings. They were projected to finish second behind Wichita State in the American’s preseason poll.
Could this season be Hardaway’s last as head coach of his alma mater? Not so fast! Hardaway restored hope on Monday with a statement victory over an Iowa State team ranked 18th in the preseason AP poll and even higher than that in the major predictive metrics. Guard Jayden Reid took over late, scoring 11 of his game-high 26 points in the final three minutes to steady the Tigers and close out an 80-76 upset victory.
Memphis could have unraveled after Iowa State reeled off seven straight points to tie the score at 69. Instead the Tigers showed impressive resolve and leaned on Reid’s ability to create offense late in the shot clock.
Is this victory an outlier? Or a sign that Memphis is poised to exceed expectations this season? We’ll find out quickly. Up next for the Tigers: VCU, Vanderbilt and Louisville. And they’ll have to play all those without center Nemanja Popović, who is suspended for the team’s opening six games of the season.
Snap judgment: But Iowa State isn’t Top-25 good without injured guard Kilyan Toure
Take nothing away from Memphis, but this result is an early red flag that Iowa State didn’t belong in the preseason top 20, let alone No. 6 in the KenPom rankings. The Cyclones were always in jeopardy of a big offensive drop-off after losing last year’s stars Joshua Jefferson to the NBA and Milan Momcilovich to the transfer portal.
The shoulder injury suffered by sophomore guard Killyan Toure this summer was also a crippling blow. Toure is Iowa State’s best perimeter defender and pro prospect. He’s expected to be out until the start of conference play at the earliest.
Snap judgment: Gonzaga, at last, has a point guard
With incoming prospect Jack Cyril opting to stay in last June’s NBA Draft and rising sophomore Mario Saint-Supery unexpectedly signing with a Spanish pro club a month later, Gonzaga began July with a glaring hole to fill.
The Zags were without a starting point guard at a time when top incoming freshmen were off the market and the transfer portal was no longer stocked with options.
Enter Xaivian Lee, the former Princeton and Florida guard once thought to have exhausted his college eligibility after completing his fourth season last spring and playing summer league with the Cleveland Cavaliers. Lee sued for an extra year of eligibility after the NCAA adopted a new rule granting players five years to play as many as five seasons. A California judge granted a preliminary injunction last month temporarily granting Lee eligibility.
Lee looked like a perfect fit for Gonzaga’s free-flowing, up-tempo system in Monday’s 78-72 victory over Purdue. He scored an efficient 18 points on just seven shots and fueled an 11-2 second-half run that gave the Zags some much-needed breathing room. He also expertly took care of the ball and dished out three assists.
Most encouraging was Lee burying 3 of 4 attempts from behind the arc, an area of his game that floundered last season in Gainesville.
If Lee can stay eligible, he might be able to make a strength out of Gonzaga’s biggest weakness.
Snap judgment: Thomas Haugh is worth every penny
Florida reportedly paid Thomas Haugh millions of dollars more to return for his senior year than the projected top 20 draft pick would have earned as an NBA rookie.
So far that looks like money well spent.
In a season-opening matchup between two of the nation’s top frontcourts Monday night, Haugh was consistently the best player on the floor. The long, athletic 6-foot-9 forward tallied 19 points, 10 rebounds and 4 assists as preseason No. 1 Florida staved off No. 14 Miami’s’ upset bid and emerged with a hard-fought 77-67 neutral-court win.
Everything that NBA teams like about Haugh was on display on Monday as he carved up Miami without needing to dominate the basketball. He defended. He attacked closeouts. He sank catch-and-shoot 3s. He crashed the glass at both ends of the floor. He cut to the rim without the basketball. In short, he looked just like the preseason All-American he’s supposed to be.
Miami will beat a lot of teams with bullyball this season.
That’s just not the right formula against Haugh and Florida.