NCAA Basketball: Updated early top-25 rankings for 2021-22 after NBA Draft deadline

After breaking out this past season with 18.6 ppg and 6.1 apg with Nevada after transferring over from Wichita State, there was a chance that Grant Sherfield would at least dip his toes into the draft waters. That didn’t happen, which gave the Wolf Pack the green light to add a couple of transfers to bolster the roster even more.

That happened with a pair of Spring pickups in Kenan Blackshear (9.4 ppg at Florida Atlantic) and AJ Bramah, a former Arizona State commit this offseason who de-committed and picked the Wolf Pack instead. In 12 games at Robert Morris, the 6’7 guard/forward averaged a whopping 21.0 ppg and 10.2 rpg and will add even more scoring to a team that already returns its top three scorers.

That includes Sherfield, 16 ppg scoring guard Desmond Cambridge and forward Warren Washington. There’s also KJ Hymes and Will Baker, a former top-50 recruit that transferred over midseason from Texas.

There are few starting lineups among the mid-majors not named Gonzaga that will be better than Nevada and with Sherfield as the best returning player in the Mountain West, they should be viewed as the league favorites for next season. And if Bramah can give them anything near he did at Robert Morris, they’ll be seen in the national rankings at some point.