Tennessee picked to finish third in SEC, Nate Ament and Ja'Kobi Gillespie voted second team

Tennessee Basketball has been picked to finish third in the SEC in the league’s preseason media poll. Florida was picked to win the SEC’s regular-season championship ahead of No. 2 Kentucky.

The Vols have now been picked to finish in the top three in the preseason media poll for three straight seasons, while no other team has been picked to do so more than twice during that time. 

Tennessee has been picked to finish in the top five in eight straight seasons. 

Freshman wing Nate Ament and transfer point guard Ja’Kobi Gillespie were voted Second Team All-SEC, alongside Florida’s Boogie Fland and Thomas Haugh and Missouri’s Mark Mitchell. 

Up Next: Tennessee vs. Duke, October 26, 7 p.m. ET, ESPN2

Kentucky’s Otega Oweh was voted the preseason SEC Player of the Year.

The five First Team All-SEC picks were Oweh, Florida’s Alex Condon, Mississippi State’s Josh Hubbard, Auburn’s Tahaad Pettiford and Alabama’s Labaron Philon Jr.. Third Team All-SEC was Ole Miss’s Malik Dia, Alabama’s Aden Holloway, Arkansas’s Karter Knox and DJ Wagner and Kentucky Jaland Lowe.

Behind Florida, Kentucky and Tennessee in the predicted order of finish was No. 4 Alabama, No. 5 Arkansas, No. 6 Auburn, No. 7 Missouri, No. 8 Ole Miss, No. 9 Texas and No. 10 Mississippi State.

Vanderbilt was picked to finish 11th, ahead of No. 12 Oklahoma, No. 13 Texas A&M, No. 14 Georgia, No. 15 LSU and No. 16 South Carolina. 

Vols ranked No. 9 in first KenPom.com ratings for 2025-26

Tennessee on Monday was ranked No. 9 in the first KenPom.com ratings update for 2025-26. The Vols are ranked No. 3 in adjusted defensive efficiency and No. 28 in adjusted offensive efficiency. 

After back-to-back Elite Eight appearances and 57 combined wins over the last two seasons, Tennessee finished at No. 5 in the KenPom ratings both last season and in the 2023-24, as well as No. 5 in both the Associated Press Top 25 and the Coaches Poll.

The Vols finished at No. 6 in the KenPom ratings in 2022-23 and No. 9 in the 2021-22. Their last KenPom finish outside the top 10 was No. 28 in 2020-21.

Tennessee last season finished No. 17 in adjusted offensive efficiency in the KenPom ratings and No. 3 on defense. The Vols were No. 28 on offense in 2023-24 and No. 3 on defense. They haven’t finished outside the top five on defense since 2019-20, including a No. 1 ranking defensively in 2022-23.

KenPom currently projects the Vols to go 21-9 from the 30 games currently on schedule. The projected losses are to Houston in the Players Era tournament in Las Vegas on November 25, at Arkansas, at Florida, at Alabama, at Kentucky, at Mississippi State, at Vanderbilt and at Missouri.

Tennessee held an open scrimmage at Food City Center Saturday morning and will host Ohio State in a closed scrimmage this Saturday in Knoxville. 

The Vols will also host Duke in a sold-out exhibition game on October 26, set for a 7 p.m. Eastern Time start on ESPN2. The regular-season starts on November 3 at home against Mercer.