While the season is still several months away, ESPN’s Joe Lunardi is hard at work providing updates around the college basketball world to give fans early ideas on the 2026 March Madness field.
Lunardi put out his updated bracketology picture this week, with Tennessee holding the same seed as it did during his debut rankings on May 8.
The Vols are slotted as the 3-seed in the West Region (San Jose). Other notable projections in the West Region include 1-seed UConn, 2-seed Arizona, 4-seed UCLA, and 5-seed North Carolina.
Tennessee’s hypothetical path sees the Vols take on 14-seed McNeese in the first round, followed by a matchup against either 6-seed Louisville or 11-seed VCU in the second round.
After the SEC’s historic run through the 2024-2025 season, Lunardi doesn’t have any Southeastern Conference teams on the one-line, which belongs to Houston, Duke, Purdue, and UConn. The highest-ranked conference teams in his projections include 2-seed Kentucky, 3-seed Tennessee, 3-seed Florida, and 4-seed Arkansas.
More From RTI: Tennessee Basketball’s Zakai Zeigler Suing NCAA, Seeking Extra Year Of Eligibility
While the roster will look plenty different from the Vols’ Elite Eight team last season, Rick Barnes has reloaded his roster with transfer portal additions and high school prospects, plus the development of players currently on the roster such as Cade Phillips and JP Estrella.
Tennessee added three players through the portal with Maryland point guard Ja’Kobi Gillespie, Vanderbilt center Jaylen Carey, and Louisiana Tech shooting guard Amaree Abram. Barnes and his new-look staff are also bringing in five-star wing Nate Ament (No. 4 overall in 2025 class), four-star shooting guard Amari Evans, four-star center DeWayne Brown, French combo guard Clarence Massamba, and three-star point guard Troy Henderson.
There has been an interesting wrinkle that has emerged since Lunardi’s rankings on Tuesday morning, though.
Reports broke later that evening that former Tennessee guard Zakai Zeigler is suing the NCAA as he seeks an extra year of eligibility with the Volunteers. Tennessee did well in adding Gillespie as a true point guard replacement for Zeigler, but it’s not hard to explain the significance of a two-time All-SEC player potentially returning for his fifth and final season.
Here’s a full look at where the SEC stands in Joe Lunardi’s latest way-too-early bracketology projection for ESPN:
- SOUTH: 2-seed Kentucky
- WEST: 3-seed Tennessee
- MIDWEST: 3-seed Florida
- EAST: 4-seed Arkansas
- SOUTH: 5-seed Auburn
- WEST: 7-seed Oklahoma
- SOUTH: 7-seed Missouri
- MIDWEST: 8-seed Mississippi State
- SOUTH: 8-seed Alabama
- WEST: 8-seed Vanderbilt
- SOUTH: 9-seed Texas
- MIDWEST: 10-seed Georgia
- SOUTH: 11-seed Ole Miss (play-in)
- FIRST TEAM OUT: Texas A&M
Check out Lunardi’s full May 20 bracketology projection here.
