Confession Time: I completely missed the announcement that Big East Basketball Media Day was coming up on Thursday, October 1st. As such, I completely whiffed on sending out ballots to my usual collection of Smart Marquette People for the preseason poll that you’ve seen here the last few years. Instead, you’ll have to settle for my own picks as opposed to the collective wisdom of several people.
Let’s go, that clock is ticking towards Thursday morning pretty quickly…..
Big East Preseason Player of the Year: Silas Demary, Connecticut Huskies
The Big East’s leader in assists last season is the only All-Big East First Team honoree from the end of last season returning for this season. Therefore: He gets to be The Man around these parts to start the season. Fun Fact: Demary is the only healthy player returning from either the First Team OR the Second Team. Teammate Solo Ball was a Second Teamer, but he was announced as sitting out the 2026-27 season because of offseason wrist surgery. That announcement came before the NCAA announced the five years/five seasons eligibility thing, so there might be a chance that Ball plays this year. However, if the April thought was “we’ll just have him sit out the year,” then I think it’s a pretty safe bet we shouldn’t be putting him on any preseason lists of anything.
Big East Preseason Freshman of the Year: Colben Landrew, Connecticut Huskies
The 6’6”, 236 pound forward from McComb, Mississippi, is the #27 prospect in the Class of 2026 according to the 247 Sports Composite system. He’s the highest ranked freshman that’s entering the Big East, so we could definitely make worse picks.
If you’re looking for possible competition as the season goes along: Providence’s Javon Bardwell is #34, Landrew’s teammate Junior County is #44, and Villanova’s Adam Oumiddoch rounds out the list of top 75 freshmen at #68.
Preseason All-Big East Team
Silas Demary, Connecticut
Nigel James, Marquette
Jackson McAndrew, Creighton
Jovan Milicevic, Xavier
Tyler Perkins, Villanova
The league is going to do their usual thing where they announce a Preseason POY and a five man Preseason All-Big East First team that does not include the POY. This is, of course, insane, because at the very least, it means that the preseason POY is not a preseason all-Big East honoree. But just because they keep doing it anyway doesn’t mean I have to do it, so this is my five-man team that includes Silas Demary.
Nigel James and Tyler Perkins are the only other guys from the all-conference squads at the end of last season that return to the Big East, so obviously they have to go on the list here. Jackson McAndrew probably would have been on the list of honorees if he had made it healthy through the season, so I’ll wager that he’ll be highly esteemed in the eyes of the coaches here. I’m guessing that someone from St. John’s roster — which has only gone up on their website in the last week at some point! — will end up on this list when the coaches vote, but I’m not seeing anyone that immediately screams to me that they need to be here at a glance. So I’m giving it to Jovan Milicevic, because Xavier’s gonna ask him to do a whole bunch of stuff for them this season, so why not?
Predicted Order Of Finish
1 — Connecticut
2 — St. John’s
3 — Marquette
4 — Villanova
5 — Providence
6 — Creighton
7 — Xavier
8 — DePaul
9 — Seton Hall
10 — Butler
11 — Georgetown
I’m mostly just throwing darts here. Connecticut has Silas Demary and Braylon Mullins and talented freshmen. St. John’s has Rick Pitino. Marquette has Nigel James and Shaka Smart needing to show that things are different. Villanova has… well, less problems than everyone else. I like Bryan Hodgson’s history of helping or actually guiding teams towards being better almost immediately, so there’s Providence for you. I don’t know what to think about Creighton now that Alan Huss is in charge, Xavier and DePaul are revamping their roster, Seton Hall only just published their roster in the last week or so, I don’t like Butler’s hire of Ronald Nored, and I really don’t like anything that Ed Cooley is doing at Georgetown, which includes not publishing a roster as of this writing. There’s the thought process.
Got comments on my picks? That’s what the comments section is for….
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