NCAA Basketball: Ranking all 8 teams in 2020 Cayman Islands Classic

The bracket for this season’s Cayman Islands Classic has been released. Which participating NCAA Basketball teams should be viewed as the favorites?

The Cayman Islands Classic is one of the newer NCAA Basketball non-conference tournaments, having only been in existence since 2017. The inaugural winner that year was the Cincinnati Bearcats, who defeated Wyoming in the finals.

In 2018, Creighton upset No. 16 Clemson to win the title game, while George Mason beat New Mexico State to become the reigning champion of the Cayman Islands Classic. This is a “mid-tier” tournament in the way that it’s not on the same level as the Maui Invitational or Battle 4 Atlantis, but the Classic usually gets 1-2 ranked programs, along with some quality mid-major competition.

One of the participating teams comes from the Mountain West, who as the sponsor of the event gets to send one team each season. They’ll be looking for their representative this year (Nevada) to get the league’s first title.

The Wolf Pack is one of eight teams already confirmed to be participating in the 2020 version of the Cayman Islands Classic. The others playing including Miami, Western Kentucky, Oregon State, Kansas State, La Salle, Ole Miss, and Northern Iowa. What wasn’t known was how the bracket would look, including the opening round matchups.

Currently, none of these teams are projected to start out the season in the top-25. But a number of them have realistic aspirations to make the 2021 NCAA Tournament, either as an at-large or winning their respective conference.

But who should be considered the favorites to win the 2020 Cayman Islands Classic? Here’s how I would rank the participants.