Hi!
If you turned up here at Anonymous Eagle looking for a new Marquette men’s basketball player preview, I have to disappoint you until Monday. With Big East Media Day coming up on October 21, we need to make some preseason picks for men’s basketball. Our picks for women’s basketball are already up on the site, so go check those out to make sure you’re up to speed on what’s going on in the league.
Instead of just making some picks and being done with it, I reached out to my Marquette Discord group
and asked who wanted to participate in a little bit of preseason polling. Thus, you’re getting the compilation of seven different opinions on the men’s basketball league instead of just my goofball opinions that you’ve come to know and tolerate.
We’ve got poll results for everything you’re going to see on Media Day: Predicted order of finish for all 11 teams in the Big East, Player of the Year, Freshman of the Year, and a preseason all-Big East team. Just to add some spice to life, I also asked the group two questions about the 2025-26 season in the conference that I think helps shed some light on the most interesting storylines that we’ll see play out this winter.
If you’re a big nerd who wants to comb through the data, feel free to check out the Google Sheet.
Here we go!
Predicted Order of Finish
This was done assigning points by way of predicted spot. Picked to win? 11 points. Picked to finish last? 1 point. Big number good, small number bad.
1 — Connecticut, 76 points (6 1st place)
2 — St. John’s, 66 (1)
3 — Marquette, 63
4 — Creighton, 61
5 — Villanova, 41
6 — Georgetown, 40
7 — DePaul, 33
8 — Providence, 31
9 — Xavier, 26
10 — Butler, 18
11 — Seton Hall, 7
For those of you playing along at home/looking at the spreadsheet: Yep, everyone voted Seton Hall last.
Outside of that, there’s a tier system here. UConn got six of the seven votes to win, so they’re kind of in a tier on their own. Tier 2 is St. John’s/Marquette/Creighton, Tier 3 is Villanova/Georgetown/DePaul/Providence and you can probably throw Xavier in there. There’s a little bit too much space down to Butler, and the fact of the matter is that everyone picked them to finish ninth or tenth, and there was variance on Xavier, all the way up to sixth place.
Let’s get into some thoughts on the placements.
Joe McCann, Scrambled Eggs Podcast: I think the national sentiment is that it’s St. Johns and UConn in some order, draw a line, then almost everyone else could finish in any order, with Seton Hall bringing up the rear. That’s about where I’m at. While I think it’s fair to be “down” on Marquette with all the experience that left, do we see 5-6 teams that are clearly better? I don’t. I think there’s enough talent back in Milwaukee that they’ll be near the top of the middle group that’s chasing St. John’s and UConn.
Alan Bykowski, Cracked Sidewalks: Fun fact: Seton Hall added six transfers from (rankings according to KenPom) #125 N.C. State, #184 Merrimack, #193 Miami (FL), #200 Jacksonville, #206 Elon, #237 Fordham, and #284 Pacific. DePaul was the second worst team in the Big East per KP at #122. That means everyone that last-place in the Big East #204 Seton Hall added came from a team that’s worse than the next worst team in the league. Not really seeing how that level of talent lifts them out of the cellar.
Big East Preseason Player of the Year: Zuby Ejiofor, St. John’s
Also Receiving Votes: Solo Ball, UConn (1); Alex Karaban, UConn (1)
I was one of the five votes for Zuby Ejiofor, and my point is simple: He’s the only returning player from last year’s All-Big East First Team. I think Joe had an interesting turn on my point:
Joe McCann, Scrambled Eggs Podcast: Ryan Kalkbrenner… oh wait, he’s finally gone? Okay, Zuby Ejiofor then. He’s the lone returning All Big East First Teamer from last year, and he’ll be terrific again for Pitino.
We can go one step further on that….
Andrei Greska, Paint Touches: Ejiofor deserved it last season and will be a beast again this year.
Let’s take a differing viewpoint…
Alan Bykowski, Cracked Sidewalks (voted for Solo Ball): Dan Hurley’s offense is set up for a player like Solo Ball, who should thrive having so many creative passers like Demary and Smith around him. He will be the superstar on the best team in the league. Come March, he’ll be one of the biggest names in the sport thanks to his ability to hit shots from anywhere and tireless work ethic.
FUN FACT: Alan did not include Ejiofor on his all-Big East team, which I think is more of an indictment of St. John’s than anything else.
Big East Preseason Freshman of the Year: Acaden Lewis, Villanova
Also Receiving Votes: Braylon Mullins, Connecticut (3)
Everyone who provided context for their vote going to Acaden Lewis made roughly the same point: Braylon Mullins is #15 in the 247 Sports Composite rankings, and Eric Reibe is #28, making them the two best ranked freshmen coming into the league. However, UConn’s roster situation is such where neither of them will be asked to carry much of a load for the Huskies, while Villanova will likely need Acaden Lewis to a A Guy if not The Guy right out of the gate.
Preseason All-Big East Team
Solo Ball, UConn
Zuby Ejiofor, St. John’s
Alex Karaban, UConn
Jackson McAndrew, Creighton
Chase Ross, Marquette
Also Receiving Votes: Ian Jackson, St. John’s (3); Tarris Reed, UConn (2); Owen Freeman, Creighton (1); Zaide Lowery, Marquette (1); Bryce Hopkins, St. John’s (1); Malik Mack, Georgetown (1)
For transparency’s sake, I’ll say it here: Three of the guys (Ball, Ejiofor, Karaban) appeared on six of the seven ballots, the other two popped up on four. You needed a majority of the voters to pick you in order to get onto the list. It’s probably not a surprise that this group of five is exclusively selected from the teams that our voting cohort picked to finish in the top four this season, not to mention in the group of four being a notable cliff dropoff to the rest of the league.
The guy I most wanted to vote for but couldn’t because I leaned back on the All-BE honors from the end of last season? UConn’s Tarris Reed. He played less than 20 minutes a game last year because Dan Hurley was loyal to Samson Johnson, but Reed had per-40 minutes stats of 19.3 points, 14.6 rebounds, and 3.2 blocks. Even if we presume that he’s only going to play 30 minutes, 70% of those stats are still amazing.
And now, some big picture questions.
Which Big East fanbase with a First Year Head Coach will feel better about their trajectory when their season is over?
Villanova: 4
Xavier: 3
I ended up being the deciding vote and my overriding thought was “Richard Pitino’s just more likable than Kevin Willard.” I’m not surprised that the vote was essentially split down the middle, mostly because it’s a little hard to expect either team to obviously be good immediately out of the gate for either guy. I liked this answer for Xavier, which is a bit of an anti-Villanova vote, too.
Joe McCann, Scrambled Eggs Podcast: Willard might do a little better than Neptune did a year ago, but Nova is projected around 4-6 in the Big East, which would mean a bubble-type team. Isn’t that about where they were with Neptune? I’m just not sure I see Willard having such a great year that Nova fans say “yes! We made a great hire!” I think it would be more like “Well, okay, I mean this is fine for year one, and he’s not Neptune so that’s good.” I don’t have a good feel for where Xavier fans are with their team, but I would guess they have that anxiety that comes with a coach bailing on you, and they just want someone to stabilize the program so it can build from here. I think Pitino can do that, even if X doesn’t make the tournament this year.
And a more pro-Nova view:
Tim Blair, Cracked Sidewalks: Villanova. As detestable as the new Nova boss can be, he’s a heck of a coach. Willard won consistently at SHU, did well at Maryland, and now finds himself in a great spot with an institution that understands what it takes to win. As the season concludes, Willard will at least meet expectations, setting up a long, successful run on the Main Line.
Which Big East men’s basketball coach is most likely to Not Be Here next year?
Thad Matta: 2
Greg McDermott: 2
Kim English: 1
Shaheen Holloway: 1
Chris Holtmann: 1
I expected this to go scatter shot, and it did. Let’s go right to the Holtmann vote:
Phil Bush, Scrambled Eggs Podcast: Honestly, it might be Holtmann. I think he’s going to drag DePaul from the dregs and make it not embarrassing to lose to them. He is way overqualified for what DePaul is so if he lifts them up this season I think other programs come calling.
Honestly, when I posed the question to the group, I didn’t even think about that as a possibility. I explained it as merely “doesn’t have to be who’s getting fired,” because my own vote is for Greg McDermott and his coach-in-waiting situation that started up this summer. McDermott’s name has rumbled around for other jobs in the last few years, and now he’s setting up a succession plan? That man doesn’t want to go to that job any more.
Alan Bykowski, Cracked Sidewalks: I think the answer is Kim English. He has shown a knack for losing the kind of clutch games that get you into the tournament. He’s finished worse than his KenPom projection three straight years and if he does it again, they’ll likely be on the outside looking in again. That probably gets Kim fired and looking for work back in the mid-major ranks.
And that’s our show! Would you have voted differently? That’s what the comments section is for.
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