We’ve reached the point in the season where every team has given itself at least one test on its schedule so far. Only four of the 364 Division I college basketball teams have gone unblemished through the opening month and a half of the season though. Three reside from the SEC, with Tennessee, Florida, and Oklahoma all off to undefeated starts. The fourth member of the group is a mid-major that has made some noise over the past handful of seasons but now has a new coach – Ben McCollum – in Drake.
So, who will remain unbeaten the longest? Even if it seems straightforward that one of the two top ten teams, Tennessee or Florida, would be the one, as SEC play heats up, it could become very tough to stretch together more than a couple of wins in that gauntlet. Oklahoma has made it to 11-0 with its own fair share of close calls but will have its hands full when it travels to Tuscaloosa to open SEC play. Even Drake has a couple of big games coming up to start Missouri Valley play. In this article, I’ll take you through each team, its start to the season, and where I think it will drop its first game.
Tennessee (11-0)
A consensus top 15 team to begin the season, Tennessee has defied even those expectations with its hot start to the year. The Volunteers have picked up five wins over KenPom top 100 opponents, the first of which came at the KFC Yum! Center in blowout fashion over Louisville. A trip to the Baha Mar Hoops – Bahamas Championship saw Tennessee notch two more impressive victories, handling both Baylor and Virginia with ease. Tennessee enjoyed a relaxing Thanksgiving break before taking down Miami at Madison Square Garden and fighting past Illinois on the road, winning at the buzzer by way of a Jordan Gainey layup.
There’s no Dalton Knecht on this year’s team, but the “replacement” in Chaz Lanier (18.9 ppg, 45.4% FG, 47.1% 3P) has had a tremendous start to the year, including 25+ point outings against Virginia, Baylor, and Syracuse. Igor Milicic Jr. (11.5 ppg, 7.7 rpg) has been another impact transfer, but the jump from Jordan Gainey (12.1 ppg, 51.2% FG, 40.5% 3P) in his second season in a Vol uniform, including his game-high 23 points and the game winner at Illinois has been what’s really seen this team’s offense skyrocket. As always though, the best teams are led by veteran point guards, and Zakai Zeigler (11.4 ppg, 7.5 apg) has been no exception to that, ranking fifth nationally in assists per game.
With two home contests against Middle Tennessee State and Norfolk State to end 2024, its extremely likely the Vols head into the new year at 13-0. On Jan. 4, Tennessee opens up SEC play hosting Arkansas, a team trending up over the last two weeks, but one the Vols should handle. On Jan. 7, Tennessee visits Florida, so following that contest in Gainesville, at least one of those two will be handed their first loss. I lean Tennessee to get the job done on the road in a likely top five matchup but still don’t make it out of January unscathed. My official prediction for Tennessee’s first loss is Jan. 18, when the Vols travel to take on in-state rival Vanderbilt under first-year head coach Mark Byington.
Florida (11-0)
The Gators had the weakest November of any of these four teams but ramped up the competition in December by handling Virginia at home in the ACC/SEC Challenge before taking down Arizona State and North Carolina on neutral floors. Florida’s 90-84 win over UNC in Charlotte was its first single digit win of the season, a testament to how dominant it has been even without playing a top tier schedule. The Gators also boast wins over Florida State, Wake Forest, and Wichita State, all of which could age a lot better as the season goes on but don’t have too much to them just yet.
Boasting quite possibly the best trio of guards in the country, the Gators have gotten off to a fantastic start even without a true point guard. Walter Clayton Jr. (18.5 ppg, 3.5 apg) is floating around the many mid-season Wooden Watch lists, while his backcourt mates Alijah Martin (15.5 ppg, 6.2 rpg) and Will Richard (12.9 ppg, 2.2 spg) have had their own strong starts to the season. All three have had at least one game already this season with 25+ points, and it’s hard to name a backcourt that could shut this trio down – besides maybe Tennessee. The guards should continue to be fantastic, but it’ll be up to the four-man frontcourt rotation led by sophomore Alex Condon (11.9 ppg, 7.4 rpg) to keep this team near the top when SEC play heats up.
Florida finishes non-conference play by hosting two Atlantic Sun opponents, with North Florida and Stetson coming to town. Even with wins over South Carolina and Georgia Tech already, I don’t think UNF has enough to upset their nationally ranked in-state rival. The game I’m looking at for Florida’s first loss comes in their first SEC game, when it travels to Lexington for Mark Pope’s first game in SEC play as Kentucky’s head coach on Jan. 4. If they make it out of Lexington unbeaten, the Gators welcome Tennessee to Gainesville on Jan. 7. It would be a healthy surprise for me if the Gators were able to start SEC play 2-0 with those two opponents on the card.
Oklahoma (11-0)
As the clock winded down in the Spectrum Center on Wednesday night, I was scared I was going to have to scrap this portion of the article. Luckily for me and the Sooners, reclass freshman Jeremiah Fears stepped up once again, hitting a four-point play that would ultimately win the game at the Jordan Brand Classic for Oklahoma against Michigan. I thought this Oklahoma team was very underrated heading into the season, but this 11-0 start exceeds my expectations by a wide margin. Michigan was Oklahoma’s sixth power conference win, with three coming at the Battle 4 Atlantis (Providence, Arizona, Louisville) and the other two being wins over Georgia Tech and Oklahoma State.
Jeremiah Fears (17.9 ppg, 4.6 apg, 2.3 spg) has been the catalyst for Oklahoma this season, even though he should still be a senior in high school and preparing for prom and graduation this spring. He made his name known in The Bahamas when he went for 20 points against Providence, besting that mark the next day with 26 in an upset over Arizona. His four-point play on Wednesday night brought him up to 30 points and a new career-high, one that I imagine will still be broken at least once in Fears’ likely one-year career. Fears has captured the headlines, but Jalon Moore (17.4 ppg, 6.0 rpg) should also be a name college basketball fans are familiar with, scoring 20+ three straight times to start the season and notching back-to-back 24-point outings in The Bahamas to claim the Battle 4 Atlantis crown.
The story has been great for Oklahoma thus far, but I do have to say that I’m still worried the Sooners could end up on the wrong side of the bubble if they struggle in conference play under Porter Moser once again. To begin conference play on Jan. 4, the Sooners travel to Tuscaloosa to take on Alabama, and I think that’s where their great success to start the season ends. The Sooners should be up to 13-0 by that point though, hosting Central Arkansas and Prairie View A&M to round out December. If Fears keeps up his tremendous start to life in college when the SEC games get rolling though, Oklahoma will continue to be a dangerous opponent every night.
Drake (10-0)
The lone non-SEC team and lone mid-major of the group of undefeated teams, Drake, has still had its fair share of tough games throughout non-conference play. Coming into the year, many avid basketball fans knew of the success Ben McCollum had in the Division II ranks at Northwest Missouri State, but there were still some skeptics. I don’t think there are anymore, with Drake cruising through the Charleston Classic in mid-November, beating Miami, Florida Atlantic, and Vanderbilt all by double-digits. The only other game of note for the Bulldogs thus far came on Tuesday night in Kansas City, when Bennett Stirtz drilled a game-winning three-pointer against his dream school to lift Drake over Kansas State in overtime.
Bennett Stirtz (18.2 ppg, 5.9 apg, 2.4 spg) is one of four players who followed Coach McCollum up from NWMSU this offseason, all of whom have at least one national championship to their name in the Division II ranks. Stirtz is the guy who the offense runs through for the Bulldogs, scoring in double-digits and reaching at least four assists in all ten games so far. Mitch Mascari (13.5 ppg, 52.2% 3P) and Daniel Abreu (13.4 ppg) are the two other double-digit scorers for Drake, both former Division II guys as well. It’s a rather tight rotation for the Bulldogs, with only eight guys consistently appearing, but the way McCollum has formed this team and fit these guys into his playstyle at the Division I level already is special.
Only one non-conference test remains for Drake, when the Bulldogs host Green Bay this Saturday, a game where you should be able to see the difference between one of the best basketball minds in the country on one side and a college basketball radio host disguised as a coach on the other side. Past that, Drake starts Missouri Valley play by hosting Belmont and Murray State, with a short road trip to UIC sandwiched in-between. None of those three games will be extremely easy for Drake, but I back the Bulldogs to get the job done. The first loss I see on the Bulldogs’ schedule comes on Jan. 8, when the Bulldogs take a midweek trip to Peoria, Illinois to take on Bradley, another top 100 team that resides in the Valley.
By this point in December, it takes more than just an easy schedule to be undefeated in college basketball. All four of these teams have done what it takes to get the job done thus far, but as conference play heats up, the stakes get higher, and the margins get smaller. I think after just one day of SEC play, two of the three undefeated teams in the SEC will go down, and the battle to be the last undefeated team comes down to Tennessee and Drake.