The 2025-26 regular season will be over in a little over a month.
It’s been an interesting year in the SEC, particularly with teams near the top of the league. This story will seek to make predictions for the rest of the year based on the trends and data that have born out over the first 20 games of the season.
3 SEC basketball predictions
Let’s dive in:
Regression is coming for Arkansas
I think we’ll see Arkansas take a step back over the next few weeks. The Razorbacks are off to a 6-2 start in SEC play, a record that includes impressive wins over Tennessee and Vanderbilt.
I have concerns with Arkansas on offense despite its No. 6 adjusted efficiency ranking on KenPom. Arkansas seems to be overly reliant on transition baskets. According to Hoop-Explorer, Arkansas is averaging an absurd 1.33 points per possession in transition this year. The frequency of transition attempts (99th percentile) is also incredibly high.
Arkansas is pretty unremarkable in the half court. The Hogs are below-average in mid-range efficiency despite being in the 70th percentile in attempts. Darius Acuff Jr. is great in the mid-range, but guys like Meleek Thomas, Trevon Brazille and even Malique Ewin take too many for their efficiency levels.
If the transition efficiency or frequency dries up at all for Arkansas, its offense is going to suffer. Defensively, Arkansas hasn’t shown much to suggest it can compensate for any lapses on the other end. The Hogs are dead-last in the SEC in effective field goal percentage allowed during conference play. I think Arkansas will sputter to an SEC record of 11-7 and will be a candidate for an early exit in the NCAA Tournament if these issues don’t get fixed before March.
Only 8 SEC teams will make the tournament
The SEC is down this season — that’s no secret. After putting together perhaps the most dominant regular season of any conference in recent history last year, the SEC is on track for a massive reduction in NCAA Tournament bids in 2025-26. Projections vary (Joe Lunardi has the SEC at 10 bids in his latest update while SDS’s Sonny Giuliano is projecting 9 in his latest bracketology) but I tend to fall on the optimistic side.
I think the SEC will struggle to get that many teams in the Big Dance. Let’s go through the landscape. Here are the teams I’m treating as locks as of now: Florida, Vanderbilt, Alabama, Tennessee, Arkansas, Auburn and Texas A&M. Baring catastrophe, I think those 7 teams will be in the bracket come March — likely with room to spare. Kentucky would be next up, but the Wildcats might be headed for the bubble thanks in part to several high-impact injuries.
After Kentucky, I don’t see many inspiring cases for at-large bids. Georgia and Texas are in range, but the Bulldogs don’t have any nonconference wins of note and the Longhorns are underwater in Bart Torvik’s wins above bubble metric. LSU was in decent shape before suffering a blowout loss at home to Mississippi State on Wednesday night. Mizzou and Oklahoma are hanging around in the top-70 of KenPom but a rise into at-large territory seems highly unlikely at this point.
The SEC’s issue on Selection Sunday is going to be its nonconference performance. Last year, when the SEC earned a record-shattering 14 bids, it was because the SEC was historically dominant in the regular season against other leagues. The SEC won 76% of its games against other high-major teams with a point differential north of +6 per game. This year? The SEC went well under .500 against the other high-majors (36-45). As of now, I’d bet on only 8 SEC teams going dancing.
Florida is trending toward being a first weekend upset candidate
A year after winning the national championship, Florida has been a bit underwhelming to start the 2025-26 season. Last year, the Gators relied heavily on the shot-making of Walter Clayton Jr. — particularly during the NCAA Tournament.
UF’s over-reliance on Clayton was almost a fatal flaw, but his clutch shooting got the Gators out of a number of tough spots. This year, Florida is an abysmal 3-point shooting team (29%).
Florida has done a good job of shifting its priorities to reflect its personnel. Instead of being an elite shooting team this year, Florida now focuses on rebounding. The Gators are No. 2 nationally in both offensive and defensive rebounding rate, per KenPom.
Per Radar360, there have only been 6 DI teams over the last 15 seasons who corralled at least 70% of defensive rebounds and 40% of offensive rebounds. Two didn’t make the Big Dance. Two were eliminated in the first round. One made the Sweet 16 and another, 2017 North Carolina, won the national championship.
The problem for Florida is that its statistical profile is a much closer match to 2016 West Virginia — a 3-seed that lost in the first round — than it is to those champion Tar Heels. That WVU squad was also a poor 3-point shooting team with an elite defense. However, the excellent rebounding and defense wasn’t enough against 14th-seeded Stephen F. Austin. It’s just one example of what can go wrong in March, but it’s a cautionary tale worth considering.
If Florida’s outside shooting doesn’t improve, it could be vulnerable to a similar exit. Specifically, the Gators need Xaivian Lee and Boogie Fland to improve. According to Hoop-Explorer, Lee and Fland are both averaging under 0.8 points per possessions on dribble jumpers and catch-and-shoot 3-pointers. That is well below-average. For context, Clayton averaged over 1.2 points per possession on those looks last season. Clayton isn’t walking through that door, but Florida has to find an answer for its lack of perimeter shooting.
Prediction Markets 2026 College Basketball Champion? Kalshi Arizona 20.0% Michigan 15.0% Duke 9.0% Houston 6.0% UConn 6.0% Illinois 5.0% Florida 4.0% Predict Learn more about Prediction Markets3 bold predictions for the rest of the 2025-26 SEC basketball season Saturday Down South.
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