2026 Men's NCAA Tournament Bracket: Latest Projection of the Field of 68
The First Four of the 2026 men's NCAA tournament will be underway in four months' time.
It'll be here before you know it, and these November results are the initial, pivotal brush strokes in painting that final bracketology picture.
One important note before we dive into this forecast: Though we typically factor Monday's games into our Tuesday morning projections, we've decided to not yet include results from the opening round of the Players Era Festival and the Maui Invitational. (Jon Rothstein may not sleep until May, but I live on the East Coast and I'm not trying to make 3 a.m. bracketology updates in November. Sorry, not sorry.)
Everything else from the first three weeks is considered, though. And by next Tuesday (Dec. 2), not only will Feast Week be fully digested, but we should also have the initial NET rankings from that Monday to nosh on.
That's when things start to feel real, even though plenty can and will change in the journey from early December to Selection Sunday.
The Projected Bracket
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East Region (Washington, D.C.)
Greenville, SC
No. 1 Duke vs. No. 16 Navy
No. 8 Wisconsin vs. No. 9 Missouri
Tampa, FL
No. 4 Tennessee vs. No. 13 Troy
No. 5 Baylor vs. No. 12 High Point
Philadelphia, PA
No. 3 Michigan State vs. No. 14 East Tennessee State
No. 6 Vanderbilt vs. No. 11 Butler / Santa Clara
Philadelphia, PA
No. 2 Connecticut vs. No. 15 Iona
No. 7 Arkansas vs. No. 10 Oregon
Midwest Region (Chicago)
Saint Louis, MO
No. 1 Purdue vs. No. 16 Vermont
No. 8 Texas Tech vs. No. 9 Ole Miss
San Diego, CA
No. 4 Iowa State vs. No. 13 Hawaii
No. 5 Indiana vs. No. 12 Yale
Greenville, SC
No. 3 Alabama vs. No. 14 UNC Wilmington
No. 6 Kansas vs. No. 11 Saint Louis
Saint Louis, MO
No. 2 Louisville vs. No. 15 Wright State
No. 7 Ohio State vs. No. 10 Georgetown
South Region (Houston)
Oklahoma City, OK
No. 1 Houston vs. No. 16 Bethune-Cookman / SIU-Edwardsville
No. 8 USC vs. No. 9 San Diego State
Oklahoma City, OK
No. 4 North Carolina vs. No. 13 McNeese
No. 5 Kentucky vs. No. 12 South Florida
Buffalo, NY
No. 3 Illinois vs. No. 14 South Dakota State
No. 6 Auburn vs. No. 11 Akron
Tampa, FL
No. 2 Florida vs. No. 15 Florida Gulf Coast
No. 7 NC State vs. No. 10 Nebraska
West Region (San Jose)
San Diego, CA
No. 1 Arizona vs. No. 16 Norfolk State / Central Connecticut
No. 8 Saint Mary's vs. No. 9 Iowa
Buffalo, NY
No. 4 Michigan vs. No. 13 Northern Iowa
No. 5 St. John's vs. No. 12 Liberty
Portland, OR
No. 3 BYU vs. No. 14 Utah Valley
No. 6 UCLA vs. No. 11 Texas / Clemson
Portland, OR
No. 2 Gonzaga vs. No. 15 Montana
No. 7 Utah State vs. No. 10 SMU
Ranking the No. 1 Seeds
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1. Purdue Boilermakers
2. Arizona Wildcats
3. Houston Cougars
4. Duke Blue Devils
We typically go at least six teams deep in this section.
That hardly seems necessary at the moment, though, as these four have created some early separation from the pack.
It's a tough call between Purdue and Arizona for the overall No. 1 spot, each in possession of three great victories away from home—Purdue winning at Alabama before beating both Memphis and Texas Tech in the Bahamas; Arizona beating Florida in Las Vegas, UCLA in Inglewood and Connecticut in Storrs.
However, because we already had Purdue at No. 1 overall one week ago, we're keeping the status quo for now.
Arizona does vault ahead of its Big 12 partner, Houston, but we'll see if that's still the case after the Cougars face Syracuse, Tennessee and a TBD third foe (possibly our current No. 5 overall seed Gonzaga) in the Players Era Festival.
Houston opened the year as our No. 1 overall seed and could jump right back into top spot by steamrolling through Las Vegas.
Speaking of steamrolling, though, Duke is doing just that. The Blue Devils beat Texas by 15 on opening night, took care of Kansas by a dozen in the Champions Classic and won their other five games by an average margin of 45.8 points. They, too, would have quite the case for No. 1 overall if they mash Arkansas (in Chicago) on Thanksgiving.
10 Words on Each of the 10 'Bubbliest' Teams
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Fifth-to-Last In: Georgetown Hoyas—Could draw BYU on Friday; might even get the upset.
Fourth-to-Last In: Texas Longhorns—Let's see if they can win three games in Maui.
Third-to-Last In: Clemson Tigers—Bounced back from Georgetown loss to win the Charleston Classic.
Second-to-Last In: Santa Clara Broncos—Could make major statement vs. Saint Louis in Acrisure Invitational.
Last Team In: Butler Bulldogs—Hoping to build on hot start better than last year.
***Cut Line***
First Team Out: Oklahoma State Cowboys—Scoring at will at home; big Thanksgiving test vs. Northwestern.
Second Team Out: Creighton Bluejays—No wins worth mentioning; will reassess after Players Era Festival.
Third Team Out: Cincinnati Bearcats—Great defense, but lost to Louisville in biggest nonconference opportunity.
Fourth Team Out: Georgia Bulldogs—Lost what might be only nonconference game vs. field (Clemson).
Fifth Team Out: Wake Forest Demon Deacons—Beat Memphis; lost by one to Michigan and Texas Tech.
ACC Summary
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6 Teams in the Projected Field: 4. Duke, 8. Louisville, 15. North Carolina, 26. NC State, 39. SMU, 42. Clemson
Also Considered: Syracuse, Wake Forest, Miami, Virginia
Biggest Development: Clemson wins Charleston Classic, climbs back into the projected field
Duke had the busiest week among ACC teams, beating Kansas by 12 in the Champions Classic on Tuesday before returning to Durham and demolishing Niagara and Howard by a combined margin of 95 points. But that merely kept the status quo for the championship-caliber Blue Devils.
Clemson had the most important week.
The Tigers entered the Charleston Classic at 4-1 with a loss at Georgetown and four meaningless, blowout, home wins over teams in the bottom 100 on KenPom. In other words, they had blown the only game that mattered in the slightest and another loss (or losses) would have raised serious early questions about their dancing chances.
Fortunately for the longest-tenured coach in this conference, they took care of business with a pair of wins—albeit both by the skin of their teeth.
Clemson trailed West Virginia 61-53 with six minutes remaining in the first game, but the Tigers closed on a 17-6 run, fueled mostly by Carter Welling, who scored 11 of their final 12 points. (They also got a late gift when WVU's Brenen Lorient forgot time and score and dunked one in with two seconds remaining in what was a three-point game. Oops.)
Sunday's championship game against Georgia went back and forth and back again. It was either a tie game or a one-possession margin for almost the entirety of the final 12 minutes of regulation, as well as the 31-point overtime period. But the Tigers eked out a 97-94 win that may well be a Quad 1 result.
Big 12 Summary
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7 Teams in the Projected Field: 2. Arizona, 3. Houston, 12. BYU, 16. Iowa State, 19. Baylor, 23. Kansas, 31. Texas Tech
Also Considered: Cincinnati, Oklahoma State, Kansas State
Biggest Development: BYU Bludgeons Badgers; Red Raiders Routed
Though Houston, Iowa State, Baylor and Kansas all played the first of their three Players Era Festival games on Monday, we'll save the commentary on that NIL extravaganza until next week's projection and instead dedicate this space to the pair of high-profile annihilations that took place on Friday.
The good result for the Big 12 was BYU beating the brakes off of Wisconsin in what was a battle between AP Top 25 foes.
The Cougars were in control pretty much throughout, jumping out to a 10-point lead within the first seven minutes. But when AJ Dybantsa quickly picked up his third and fourth fouls early in the second half, the door appeared to be open for the Badgers to make things interesting. Instead, Richie Saunders took over, scoring 26 as the Cougars cruised to a 98-70 blowout.
A few hours later, though, Texas Tech got creamed by Purdue in the title game of the Baha Mar tournament.
It was a good game for about 13 minutes, but in the blink of an eye, Purdue turned a 26-23 lead into a 57-26 deluge. The scary thing is it wasn't even a case of Braden Smith and/or Trey Kaufman-Renn catching fire. There were eight buckets during the 20-0 run that effectively ended the game before halftime, and they were scored by seven different Boilermakers.
Between that beatdown, the one-point win over Wake Forest that preceded it and the loss to short-handed Illinois from two weeks ago, Texas Tech sure is making an early case for the annual title of "team from the preseason AP Top 10 that might not make the NCAA tournament."
Big East Summary
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4 Teams in the Projected Field: 6. Connecticut, 17. St. John's, 40. Georgetown, 44. Butler
Also Considered: Creighton, Villanova
Biggest Development: Butler 'Wins' Greenbriar Tip-Off; UConn falls to Arizona
Officially, the Greenbriar Tip-Off was not a bracketed MTE with a champion crowned. Rather, it was four teams each playing a pair of pre-determined matchups in which it could have been possible for everyone to go 1-1 or for two teams to go 2-0.
As luck would have it, though, the two winners from Friday (Butler over South Carolina; Virginia over Northwestern) squared off on Sunday in a de facto title game with the Bulldogs emerging victorious.
Finley Bizjack was the star with 43 points between the two games, but Michael Ajayi's early rampage continued with his fifth and sixth consecutive double-doubles to open the season. He never got going last year at Gonzaga, but he's back to playing like the wrecking ball who averaged 17 points and 10 rebounds at Pepperdine two seasons ago.
With that duo leading the charge, maybe Butler is going to matter for the first time since 2020?
But while Butler scored a pair of respectable neutral-site wins, the Big East's torchbearer took a tough home loss to Arizona.
With big man Tarris Reed Jr. (ankle) unavailable for the Huskies, it simply wasn't a fair fight in the paint. Arizona's freshman phenom Koa Peat went for 16 points and 12 rebounds, 7'2" Motiejus Krivas added 14 boards as the Wildcats finished plus-20 on the glass in the 71-67 victory.
We're not going to penalize UConn much at all for that one, given the circumstances. But if the Huskies were to also lose to Illinois (at MSG on Friday), we'll need to reevaluate.
Big Ten Summary
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12 Teams in the Projected Field: 1. Purdue, 10. Michigan State, 11. Illinois, 13. Michigan, 20. Indiana, 24. UCLA, 27. Ohio State, 30. Wisconsin, 32. USC, 36. Iowa, 37. Nebraska, 38. Oregon
Also Considered: Northwestern, Washington
Biggest Development: Sparty Thumps BBN; Nebrasketball Wins HOF Classic
If you kindly ignore Rutgers' horrific home loss to Central Connecticut and don't pay too much mind to Wisconsin getting pummeled by BYU, it was yet another solid week from the 18-team Big Ten with just 10 overall losses to date. (That's 0.55 losses per team, compared to 1.36 in the Big East, 1.06 in the SEC, 0.94 in the ACC and 0.88 in the Big 12.)
In addition to the aforementioned thrashing Purdue put on Texas Tech, two big positives for the league were Michigan State's statement win over Kentucky in the Champions Classic and the Cornhuskers improving to 6-0 by winning the Hall of Fame Classic.
In the former, we were treated to quite the glimpse of what the Spartans can do when they actually make shots.
After going 13-for-60 from three-point range in their first three games, they seemingly couldn't miss against the Wildcats, starting out 7-for-11 en route to an 11-for-22 night and a 17-point victory. They also owned the glass and clamped down on defense, as was their M.O. one year ago while winning the Big Ten by a three-game margin.
That's one marquee win over a blue blood, and they could add two more soon, facing North Carolina in Florida on Thanksgiving before hosting Duke on Dec. 6. Could become a projected No. 1 seed in a hurry if they stay hot.
And while Nebraska is nowhere close to the No. 1 seed conversation, the 'Huskers do jump more comfortably into the projected field after beating both New Mexico and Kansas State in Kansas City.
In each game, they jumped out to a huge lead within the first 10 minutes and managed to withstand both comeback attempts. Freshman Braden Frager went for a combined 36 points and 14 rebounds off the bench and could be the glue guy for a program seeking its first-ever win in the NCAA tournament.
SEC Summary
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10 Teams in the Projected Field: 7. Florida, 9. Alabama, 14. Tennessee, 18. Kentucky, 21. Auburn, 22. Vanderbilt, 28. Arkansas, 34. Ole Miss, 35. Missouri, 41. Texas
Also Considered: LSU, Georgia
Biggest Development: Alabama scores another big win while the SEC basement sinks lower
Even before facing Gonzaga in the Players Era Festival on Monday night, Alabama had already run through quite the gauntlet, winning at St. John's and losing at home to Purdue prior to beating Illinois (in Chicago) this past week behind a masterful performance from Labaron Philon.
That's now a true road win over KenPom No. 16 and a semi-road win over KenPom No. 7, and those two results are doing a whole lot of heavy lifting for a league that otherwise entered Monday with a 1-15 record against the KenPom top 60. Even the win—Florida over Miami on a neutral floor—wasn't anything special.
That leaguewide lack of marquee wins is exacerbated by the fact that the bottom of the SEC might actually be kind of bad this year.
With Mississippi State going 0-2 in the HOF Classic (Kansas State and New Mexico) while South Carolina lost both of its games in the Greenbriar Tip-Off (Butler and Northwestern), those two teams, Oklahoma and Texas A&M are now a combined 0-9 against the KenPom top 150.
Though LSU and South Carolina went a combined 5-33 against conference foes last year, perhaps the biggest thing that made the SEC a 14-bid league was the fact that even its worst teams would have been expected to post a winning record in either the ACC or Big East.
This year, it already feels like 12 bids might be the max. And even that will prove to be overly optimistic if the SEC doesn't start stockpiling quality wins by someone other than Alabama.
Mid-Majors Summary (A10, AAC, MVC, MWC, WCC)
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8 Teams in the Projected Field: 5. Gonzaga, 25. Utah State, 29. Saint Mary's, 33. San Diego State, 43. Santa Clara, 45. Saint Louis, 48. South Florida, 52. Northern Iowa
Also Considered: VCU, George Washington, Dayton, Boise State, Memphis
Biggest Development: Utah State Dominates in Charleston
While Clemson won the more high-profile Palmetto Bracket of the Charleston Classic, Utah State put on an absolute clinic in the Lowcountry Bracket, stomping Tulane and Davidson by a combined margin of 55 points.
Incredibly, Tulane shot 15-for-30 from three-point range in the opener, but the Aggies simply ran away from the Green Wave in the second half, averaging darn near 1.7 points per possession. As he often is, Mason Falslev was unstoppable in that one, finishing with 24 points, seven rebounds and four steals.
Against Davidson, though, it was the MJ Collins show, as the Vanderbilt transfer went off for 40 points on 19 shots. His career high through his first three seasons was 20, but he has scored at least 21 in four out of six games, becoming an early top candidate for the unofficial title of Mid-Major Player of the Year.
The Aggies were already in our projected field, but only barely and as an at-large team behind San Diego State. Between the statement USU made in South Carolina and SDSU's home loss to Troy, though, the Aggies now seem like the team to beat in the Mountain West.
In fact, it could be quite a while before someone does beat them.
With 47 undefeated teams as of Monday morning, we're still about two weeks away from our annual "Predicting when every remaining undefeated team will suffer its first loss" article. But unless the Aggies take an L at South Florida next Thursday, they just might be the last team standing.
Other 21 Leagues Summary
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21 Teams in the Projected Field: 46. Akron, 47. Liberty, 49. High Point, 50. Yale, 51. McNeese, 53. Hawaii, 54. Troy, 55. UNC Wilmington, 56. Utah Valley, 57. East Tennessee State, 58. South Dakota State, 59. Florida Gulf Coast, 60. Montana, 61. Wright State, 62. Iona, 63. Navy, 64. Vermont, 65. Bethune-Cookman, 66. SIU-Edwardsville, 67. Central Connecticut, 68. Norfolk State
Also Considered: N/A
Biggest Development: High Point Cruises in Boardwalk Battle
To put it lightly, the Boardwalk Battle wasn't as highly anticipated at a national level as, say, the Players Era Festival, Maui Invitational or Battle 4 Atlantis.
In fact, unless you pay for Baller TV, you might not have even realized this tournament already happened.
High Point won it, though, beating both Illinois-Chicago and Incarnate Word by double digits to further cement the Panthers as the Big South's big tuna.
Kentucky fans might remember High Point's star player, Cam'Ron Fletcher. He was a freshman during that calamitous 2020-21 campaign before spending three years with Florida State and last year with Xavier, never managing to make the type of impact that was expected from him.
In year No. 6, though, Fletcher has found his mojo. He scored a career-high 27 in the win over UIC and went for 18 points and 12 rebounds two days later against UIW.
High Point already lost at UAB, but it's plausible the Panthers won't lose again this season en route to what could be a second straight year as a No. 13 seed in the Dance.
