Cincinnati Bearcats Basketball Ranked Outside Big 12's Top 10 Teams Ahead of 2025-26 Season

CINCINNATI — The Athletic released its 2025-26 Big 12 preseason basketball rankings this week, and CJ Moore is not very bullish on the Bearcats.

Cincinnati checked in at No. 11 out of 16 teams. Wes Miller is projected to have another solid squad with a defined high floor, but consistent floundering in league play over the past few years has them capped in this exercise.

"This is a huge year for Miller, and he’s built an interesting roster," Moore wrote. "The swing piece is Baba Miller, the 21-year-old Spaniard who has flashes that intrigue scouts. It just hasn’t translated to winning in his first three years in college. Moustapha Thiam is similar. He was one of the most productive freshmen in the Big 12 last year at UCF, but that productivity was on a bad team, and he took more jumpers than felt appropriate. But you cannot deny there’s talent on this roster. According to 247Sports, the Bearcats had the 17th-best class — freshmen and transfers combined — in college hoops, one spot below Kansas.

"Shon Abaev is the second-highest rated recruit the Bearcats have ever landed in the 247Sports database. Jalen Haynes doesn’t have the upside of his frontcourt buddies, but he has won, leading George Mason to a surprising Atlantic 10 regular-season title last season. Sencire Harris was one of the best defensive guards available in the portal, and Jordi Rodriguez has been a solid contributor for Spain’s youth teams and played in the country’s top league (the ACB). Tyler McKinley and Keyshuan Tillery were both top-100 recruits, and Jalen Celestine and Kerr Kriisa were rotation players for NCAA Tournament teams a year ago. There’s a lot of lineup versatility, good positional size, and reason for optimism. But you could have said the same thing the last two years, and Cincinnati is 14-24 so far in the Big 12. Maybe this is buyer’sremorse from believing last season."

It's going to be a similar story surrounding this program until the dog days of January in the Big 12. Cincinnati has a pretty similar non-conference slate to last season in terms of opposing talent and venues. That 2024 slate produced the 309th toughest non-conference strength of schedule according to KenPom.

It should be harder than that this year, but not anywhere close to the level of competition that will clearly tell us how Cincinnati's Big 12 results will play out. We will get a strong feel for how this team shapes up in the Big 12 once the dust settles on the first month of conference play.

Check out the whole ranking here.

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