After a brief drop, the Duke basketball team is a No. 1 seed again in ESPN’s Bracketology.
Joe Lunardi, the longtime college basketball bracket expert, released an updated round of preseason projections on Tuesday. The Blue Devils, whom he dropped to a No. 2 seed back in June, shifted back up to join Kansas, Houston, and Alabama on the top line.
The Blue Devils, now led by top-ranked freshman [autotag]Cooper Flagg[/autotag] and the best recruiting class in the country, initially held the top overall seed when Lunardi first released his 2025 projections in April. However, thanks to a strong transfer class, the Jayhawks unseated Jon Scheyer’s team on top.
After some brief doubts about how many first-year players Duke will rely on in 2024-25, it seems like the Cooper Flagg hype train has finally won out.
North Carolina, one of five other ACC schools included in the projected bracket, made it as a No. 2 seed in another region. The two-time defending national champions, the Connecticut Huskies, actually matched as the second team in Duke’s East region.