Tuesday Headlines: Kentucky Basketball in the KenPom Rankings

NCAA Basketball: Kentucky Blue Madness — Jordan Prather-Imagn Images

Their KenPom ranking is a bit off their AP ranking.

The Associated Press released its preseason top-25 rankings on Monday, and the Kentucky Wildcats, to some surprise, made the list. Mark Pope’s Wildcats came in at No. 23, trailing seven fellow members of the SEC. The entire list can be found here.

While it had to feel good for Pope to receive some recognition for the job well done by both he and his staff to put together a brand-new roster for Kentucky, the Wildcats were ranked quite a bit higher in the AP top-25 than in KenPom.

In fact, the KenPom rankings don’t exactly place a high value on the Wildcats in their current state — ranking Kentucky No. 42 on their preseason list.

A full breakdown of how KenPom views the Wildcats and how their season might go can be found here.

Though KenPom rankings are much more analytically driven than the AP top-25, at the end of the day, they’re all preseason rankings. It only matters what Pope and his team can do on the court once the regular season starts on November 4th against Wright State.

Let us know if you agree with the KenPom or AP top-25 ranking in the comments below.