Kansas tops preseason AP poll for 2023-24 season, Duke No. 2

The Associated Press released its first Top 25 poll for the upcoming 2023-24 men’s college basketball season and the Kansas Jayhawks will enter the new season as the No. 1 ranked team. The Duke Blue Devils follow them at No. 2 while the Purdue Boilermakers, Michigan State Spartans, and Marquette Golden Eagles round out the top five.

Kansas is coming off a 28-win campaign last season and its biggest addition was landing Michigan transfer Hunter Dickinson. The two-time First-Team All-Big Ten center was the top ranked player in the transfer portal this offseason and was voted on as preseason Big 12 Player of the Year. Key contributors like Kevin McCullar Jr. and KJ Adams Jr. have returned for another season while four-star freshman guard Elmarko Jackson should make big contributions in his first season.

Duke poses to be a serious threat as they return nearly everyone from last year’s young team that won the ACC Tournament. Center Kyle Filipowski won ACC Rookie of the Year a season ago and the sophomore should be a Wooden Award candidate this year. Meanwhile, Purdue is looking for redemption after becoming just the second one-seed in NCAA Tournament history to be bounced by a 16-seed last March. After flirting with the NBA Draft, consensus national player of the year Zach Edey decided to return for his senior season.

Defending national champion UConn is No. 6 and will have and will have to retool a bit after losing top scorers Adama Sanogo and Jordan Hawkins. Meanwhile, national runner-up San Diego State is No. 17 and will also have to retool a bit after losing pieces from the team that made the title game.

Other notable rankings include Florida Atlantic starting the year at No. 10 in its first season in the ACC. The Owls are fresh off a surprise run to the Final Four and could be the top mid-major team in the country with several important players from last year’s team back on the court for head coach Dusty May. No. 11 Gonzaga lost Drew Timme and Julian Strawther to the NBA, but picked up a huge transfer in former Creighton guard Ryan Nembhard.