Once again CBS Sports presents our Candid Coaches series, which spotlights relevant topics and issues in men’s college basketball. Gary Parrish and Matt Norlander polled nearly 100 coaches in recent weeks on a variety of topics. Coaches spoke on background and were provided anonymity to offer unfiltered opinions. This is the third installment in our 2025 survey; links to our previous questions can be found at the bottom of this story.
Earlier this week we unveiled an annual question we ask: Who’s going to be the best team?
Now it’s time for another one of our reliables: Who’s going to be the best player?
College basketball has had a fortunate run this decade in returning First Team All-Americans. And so it gets that again with not just one well-known stud, but two. Braden Smith of Purdue and JT Toppin of Texas Tech both earned First Team status (along with Cooper Flagg, Johni Broome and Walter Clayton Jr.) here at CBS Sports when we published our All-America honors in the lead-up to the 2025 Final Four.
Smith is a senior, Toppin a junior. Smith is poised to finish his four-year college career as one of the most statistically decorated point guards of the past few generations. Toppin, after commanding one heck of a payday, didn’t even enter his name into the draft despite being a first-round talent in the eyes of some NBA evaluators.
Those two, predictably, earned the most votes in our poll question this year, but it’s not as though they’re the only high-level talents. Just the opposite. We had seven players earn at least five votes, with three of those being glitzy freshmen and the other two being transfers into the Big Ten.
Candid Coaches: Who will be the best men’s college basketball team this season?
Matt Norlander
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