Ahead of winning the Big 12 last season, only one of the league’s 16 coaches picked Arizona to take the title. And not a single Wildcat was tabbed to the preseason all-conference team.
What a difference a year makes.
Arizona has been picked to repeat as Big 12 champs, while veterans Ivan Kharchenkov and Motiejus Krivas
are preseason all-league selections. Krivas was named Big 12 Preseason Player of the Year.The Wildcats earned 12 of 16 first-place votes, good enough for 220 points, while second-place Houston got the other four first-place votes and 214 points. Kansas, Iowa State and Texas Tech rounded out the top five, while in-state rival ASU was picked to finish 12th.
Krivas enters his fourth season at Arizona after bypassing the 2026 NBA Draft. He was an All-Big 12 and All-Defensive Team selection a year ago in helping the Wildcats sweep the regular season and conference tournament titles and reach the Final Four for the first time in 25 years.
Kharchenkov is coming off a strong freshman season in which he started all 39 games. Both Kharchenkov and Krivas averaged 10.4 points per game in 2025-26.
Kansas’ Tyran Stokes was named Big 12 Preseason Freshman of the Year, while former UA wing Paulius Murauskas was tapped as Preseason Newcomer of the Year. Muraukas played for Arizona in 2023-24 as a freshman before transferring to Saint Mary’s, playing there for two years, then came with coach Randy Bennett to ASU this offseason.
Arizona will participate in the Big 12’s Media Days event Wednesday in Kansas City, with coach Tommy Lloyd joined by Kharchenkov, Krivas and freshman Caleb Holt.
