Tennessee basketball has landed near the top of the preseason SEC conversation, and the Vols’ new-look roster is already drawing plenty of attention.
Jeff Goodman’s preseason conference rankings place Rick Barnes’ team at No. 3 in the SEC for the 2026-27 season, trailing only Florida at No. 1 and Texas at No. 2. Behind Tennessee on the list are Arkansas, Kentucky, Alabama, Vanderbilt, LSU, Missouri, Ole Miss, Texas A&M, Auburn, Oklahoma, Georgia, Mississippi State and South Carolina.
The ranking comes as teams work through summer practices and evaluators get a clearer picture of how rosters are coming together. Tennessee, after reaching the Elite Eight for a third straight year, went hard after the transfer portal in an effort to build a group that can finally push through to the Final Four.
This version of the Vols will look a lot different. Tennessee brings back only two players from last season’s team: forward DeWayne Brown II and guard Troy Henderson, both entering their sophomore seasons and now expected to take on leadership roles.
The portal additions are the headliners. Tennessee added Wake Forest guard Juke Harris, VCU guard Terrence Hill Jr., Cal guard Dai Dai Ames and Notre Dame wing Jalen Haralson, among others. That group joins a freshman class led by Alabama decommit Chris Washington Jr.
Barnes said the early signs have been encouraging.
“I love this time of year,” Barnes said. “I think that when you got a group of guys that wanna be good, I think they embrace it, too.
You talk about being forged in fire, you know, you gotta turn it up every day. You gotta get the furnace hot, and you gotta get them to understand what’s coming.
We know what’s coming, our schedule, what we have in front of us.
“But yeah, I think they’ve embraced it. We haven’t had any type of attitude situation.
Guys are doing what they’re doing, not only out here, but in the weight room, where there’s a lot of team bonding going on there, and just looking out for each other. We’ve got a good group of guys, but we got a long ways to go, like you’d expect this time of year.
But up to this point, I would say we’re very pleased with them.”
In Other News...
Neyland Is Getting A Fresh Look Before Tennessees Biggest 2026 Moments
Neyland Stadium is getting a fresh playing surface as the University of Tennessee Grounds Crew has installed new real grass ahead of the 2026 football season. The timing fits a stadium that has spent plenty of time serving as more than a football venue lately, with Neyland recently hosting a Savannah Bananas game and a Luke Combs concert before attention turned back to Saturdays in the fall.
The reset comes with a loaded 2026 slate waiting on the other side, beginning with a home opener against Furman on Sept. 5 and rolling into a run of SEC matchups that will quickly test the new field. Texas is on the early schedule in a Checker Neyland atmosphere, and the rest of the home calendar brings the kind of opponents that will keep the stadium in the spotlight well beyond opening weekend. [Read more 🡒]
Tennessees Transfer Haul Just Earned A Ranking Vols Fans Will Debate
Tennessees offseason transfer haul already looked ambitious on paper, and now it has a little more external validation to go with it. Three Man Weaves 2027 rankings placed three Vols among its top 100 transfers, giving Rick Barnes roster a national spotlight after Tennessee added eight players from the portal and reshaped much of the lineup in one busy stretch.
Jalen Haralson, Terrence Hill and Juke Harris all landed in the mix, with Tennessee set to lean on a group that arrives from Notre Dame, VCU and Wake Forest, respectively. The ranking will only fuel the usual debate around how quickly portal-heavy teams can mesh, especially with several other highly regarded players on the schedule and plenty of chances for these new faces to prove the list right or wrong. [Read more 🡒]
Tennessee Is Getting Preseason Respect But Two Huge Questions Remain
Phil Steeles preseason list has given Tennessee a respectable early perch, slotting the Vols at No. 18 and eighth in the SEC. That kind of placement says there is real belief in what Josh Heupel has coming back, especially with a schedule that features several ranked league opponents and, in a helpful twist, most of those games set for Knoxville.
Even so, the optimism comes with two obvious asterisks. Tennessee is breaking in a new defensive system under coordinator Jim Knowles, and the offense still has to settle the most important spot on the field before anyone can treat the ranking as more than a summer snapshot. ESPN has pointed to the quarterback race as one of the biggest uncertainties in the country, which is exactly why the Vols ceiling feels so high and their floor still feels hard to pin down. [Read more 🡒]