Nebraska men’s basketball will open the 2026-27 season outside the AP Top 25, coming in just short of the preseason ranking released Monday after a 14th-place finish last year.
The Huskers received 70 votes, leaving them two spots out of the poll despite being picked to finish fifth in the Big Ten by the media. Nebraska is one of several teams on the fringe of the rankings, but not one of the 25 that made the cut.
The preseason list puts Florida at No. 1, followed by Duke, Illinois, Connecticut and Arizona. Michigan State checks in at No. 6, with Texas, Tennessee, Virginia, Houston and Louisville rounding out the top 10.
Nebraska’s Big Ten presence near the top also includes Illinois at No. 3, Michigan at No.
16, Iowa State at No. 18, USC at No.
21, UCLA at No. 22 and others inside the poll.
For Nebraska, the ranking omission only sharpens the spotlight around a schedule that already includes plenty of tests. A dozen of the Huskers’ 32 regular-season games will come against AP-ranked teams or programs that earned votes. Of their three exhibition opponents, BYU is ranked No. 25, while Saint Louis sits effectively at No. 32 based on the voting.
The first two exhibitions offered an early look at where Nebraska stands. The Huskers dropped a 72-61 decision at BYU in Provo, Utah, on Oct. 16, and also fell 79-74 at home to Saint Louis on Oct.
- Those results haven’t changed the bigger picture for coach Fred Hoiberg, who appears to be using October to sort out the roster and see what it can become.
Nebraska’s next exhibition comes against Kansas State in Grand Island, Nebraska, on Oct. 26.
The games that count arrive soon after, with the Huskers set to host Le Moyne at Pinnacle Bank Arena on Nov. 2 at 6:30 p.m. CST before heading to Uncasville, Connecticut, to play Providence on Nov.
Pryce Sandfort, a senior forward and one of two unanimous preseason All-Big Ten selections, is expected to lead the way for a team trying to keep climbing under Hoiberg. Nebraska’s path won’t be simple, especially after replacing four starters from a program-record 28-win team.
So far, the Huskers have started to settle into a group they like, even with Belmont transfer Sam Orme unavailable for the first two exhibitions. Through those two games, Sandfort, reigning Big Ten Sixth Man of the Year Braden Frager and Nebraska native Cale Jacobsen have earned starting roles after returning from last season’s team. They’ve been joined by Utah Valley transfer Trevan Lenhardt and Boston College transfer Boden Kapke.
Nebraska proved last season it could outplay expectations, and the same challenge is in front of this group again. The preseason results have been uneven, but they’re only a snapshot. The Huskers still have time to find their rhythm, and they’ll get plenty of chances to show whether this roster can turn a weak preseason reception into a much stronger season.
In Other News...
Oregon Exposed A Nebraska Problem That May Get Worse
Nebraskas offense spent a long afternoon trying to find any kind of rhythm against Oregon and never really did. The Huskers managed 242 yards on 67 snaps, with quarterback Anthony Colandrea doing what he could to keep drives alive, finishing 18 of 33 for 164 yards and a touchdown while adding 38 rushing yards and another score on the ground. Even with that effort, the bigger picture was hard to miss: the run game never got rolling, the passing game lacked separation, and the offense as a whole looked stuck in place.
The issues went beyond one bad outing, too. Nebraskas top running backs were held to 58 yards on 18 carries, the offensive line gave up a sack and five pressures, and four penalties made an already uneven night even messier. Injuries along the line and at running back only added to the concern, while receivers struggled to create the kind of space that can help an offense recover when the ground game is bottled up, leaving a problem that could be even tougher to solve if the same limitations keep piling up. [Read more 🡒]
Nebraska Left Wondering After Two Late Replay Moments Swung Everything
For much of the night, Nebraska had a chance to leave with a statement win before Oregon finally nudged in front with 28 seconds left. The finish came with the kind of replay drama that tends to stick with a team long after the final whistle, starting with a touchdown catch by Kwazi Gilmer that was upheld after officials said there was not enough clear evidence to overturn it.
Then came the other moment that had Nebraska wondering what might have been. A potential late fumble by Isaiah Mozee was not reviewed, and the Cornhuskers kept possession as the game tightened in its closing stretch. In a contest decided by the smallest of margins, those two replay decisions became part of the story almost as much as the score itself. [Read more 🡒]
Nebraska Fans Have One Brutal Debate After Another Late Collapse
Nebraskas recent stretch has left fans stuck in an uncomfortable place: encouraged by how far the program has come, but frustrated by how often close games are slipping away late. The Cornhuskers dropped tight decisions to Indiana and Oregon after holding leads in both, a sequence that has sharpened the conversation around whether the progress under Matt Rhule is real enough to matter when the fourth quarter arrives.
Against Oregon, the offensive issues were impossible to ignore, with nine punts and little production on the ground, even as the defense did enough for three quarters to keep the game within reach. The broader picture still shows a team that has outperformed preseason expectations, but the debate now is whether thats enough when the same late-game breakdown keeps showing up in the toughest moments. [Read more 🡒]