Jay Bilas lists college hoops teams he sees as National Title contenders

The College GameDay crew is in Knoxville, Tennessee this morning ahead of the Volunteers’ game against Texas, where head coach Rick Barnes will have a chance to avenge his former school on the big stage. During the morning broadcast, ESPN college hoops analyst Jay Bilas slated both of those orange powerhouses as National Title contenders along with a number of other programs.

Here were 11 teams that Bilas sees as the true contenders to cut down the nets in Houston this coming April:

• Purdue
• Alabama
• Houston
• UCLA
• Arizona
• Tennessee
• Texas
• Kansas
• Xavier
• UCONN
• Virginia

The Cavaliers have flown a bit under the radar this season, but according to Bilas: “Virginia is making a play in that realm.” He credits their recent hot streak to a new offensive-minded lineup from head coach Tony Bennett. “Because not only can they defend, but they’re starting to really score at a higher clip. And playing that smaller lineup with Ben Vander Plas in there spreads things out. They can make shots.”

A Virginia team hasn’t been this dangerous on the offensive side of the ball since their 2019 title-winning group.

Bilas also highlighted the Xavier Musketeers as a program that’s come on strong since the turn of the calendar year. He believes Sean Miller has those boys in position to win the Big East crown and do some major damage in March.

“Watch out for Xavier. You know, they haven’t defended as well throughout the course of the season, but they’re getting better. And offensively, they’ve got a lot of firepower.”

Watch out for the Musketeers. Bilas thinks they and several other schools on that list have higher ceilings than their records or anlytical profiles may suggest.

“One of the things about all the analytics, when you look at these records, the records and their analytics to this point tell you what the team has done. They don’t necessarily tell you what the team is capable of. Some of those teams are capable of more and I think they’re going to get better as the season goes along.”

So there you have it. The 11 teams Jay Bilas could see winning the NCAA Tournament. About a month and a half until the Big Dance gets underway.