Kansas State enters Casey Alexander’s first season with the preseason Big 12 media poll offering little optimism.
The Wildcats were slotted in a tie for 14th place Thursday, sharing that spot with Colorado and landing ahead of only Utah in the league’s preseason rankings. For Alexander, who was hired after last season to replace the fired Jerome Tang in March, the tepid outlook fits a roster situation that has been hard to build from the jump.
Kansas State returns just one player from last season’s team, Andrej Kostic, leaving Alexander with a major reconstruction project in his debut year. Still, the new coach brings a track record that suggests he’s suited for this kind of reset. Before taking over in Manhattan, he won 166 games and four conference championships over the last seven seasons at Belmont.
The challenge is steep. Kansas State has slipped every season since reaching the Elite Eight in 2023 under Tang, and last year’s 12-20 finish marked a third straight missed NCAA Tournament.
Alexander is looking to Kostic and two transfers to help steady the lineup. Brandon Rechsteiner, who was a key piece for Colorado State last season, and Jaden Schutt, who comes over from Virginia Tech, are both expected to start when the season begins.
Kostic’s development matters too. As a freshman, he averaged 5.2 points while shooting 37 percent from the field, and Kansas State is counting on him to take a step forward.
At the top of the preseason poll, Arizona earned 12 first-place votes and 220 points, followed by Houston with four first-place votes and 214 points. Kansas came in third with 186 points, just ahead of Iowa State at 181 and Texas Tech at 180.
The rest of the poll had BYU at sixth, TCU seventh, Cincinnati and West Virginia tied for eighth, Baylor 10th, Oklahoma State 11th, Arizona State 12th, UCF 13th, Colorado and Kansas State tied at 14th, and Utah last.
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