Completed Event: Men's Basketball versus Utah on November 25, 2025 , Win , 68, to, 58
M Basketball
vs Utah
W 68-58
Grand Canyon University Athletics
KenPom puts GCU 80th nationally, 5th in MW
10/13/2025 9:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball, Paul Coro, Lopes Insider Blog
Sites, accounts unanimously rank Lopes in top 100, as high as 4th in MW
One Grand Canyon exhibition game is in the books, and so are many metric projections and predictions for what the Lopes will do this season.
Ken Pomeroy, the most highly regarded advanced analyst in college basketball, released his preseason KenPom rankings with GCU at No. 80 nationally and fifth in the Mountain West.
Pomeroy's metrics considers the Lopes to be the most balanced team in the Mountain West, which he rates as the sixth-strongest conference of 31 in the nation. He has GCU's offensive efficiency at No. 79 and defensive efficiency at No. 87.
The KenPom statistical outlook is based on the players' previous performance for GCU or other teams. It put the Lopes behind San Diego State (No. 30), Utah State (No. 42), Boise State (No. 53) and Colorado State (No. 79) in the MW.
GCU was projected to go 20-10 (12-8 in MW), but the Lopes are a difficult formula with only two players who have played together previously (junior guards Caleb Shaw and Makaih Williams).
Other sites and accounts all have GCU in the national top 100 of 365 Division I programs with a ranking high as No. 73 ranking (top 20%) by CBB Review. The Lopes' projected MW placements fell between fourth by three outlets and eighth by one metric.
T3Bracketology also put out its first NCAA Tournament seeding projection and included GCU as one of the No. 10 seeds. It also had San Diego State and No. 6, Boise State as a No. 11.
San Diego State received 74 voting points in preseason AP Top 25 voting to be the third team on the outside.
GCU lost 79-74 in a Friday exhibition game at Baylor, where Williams was held out for precautionary health reasons. The Lopes will play USC in a final exhibition game on Oct. 25 at Global Credit Union Arena before opening the regular season with a Nov. 3 home game against Purdue Fort Wayne.
"Last year, we kind of had an idea what we were going to get from some of our guys," GCU head coach Bryce Drew said. "This year, we learned a lot from watching these guys to go back to practice. That's one of the reasons I wanted to play so early, so we could see stuff and then we've got two weeks before USC that we can make some adjustments."
The MW coaches and media preseason polls will be revealed as part of MW Media Day in Las Vegas on Oct. 23. San Diego State, Utah State and Boise State were the conference programs consistently projected ahead of GCU. Here is a look at others' rankings:
Ken Pomeroy, the most highly regarded advanced analyst in college basketball, released his preseason KenPom rankings with GCU at No. 80 nationally and fifth in the Mountain West.Pomeroy's metrics considers the Lopes to be the most balanced team in the Mountain West, which he rates as the sixth-strongest conference of 31 in the nation. He has GCU's offensive efficiency at No. 79 and defensive efficiency at No. 87.
The KenPom statistical outlook is based on the players' previous performance for GCU or other teams. It put the Lopes behind San Diego State (No. 30), Utah State (No. 42), Boise State (No. 53) and Colorado State (No. 79) in the MW.
GCU was projected to go 20-10 (12-8 in MW), but the Lopes are a difficult formula with only two players who have played together previously (junior guards Caleb Shaw and Makaih Williams).
Other sites and accounts all have GCU in the national top 100 of 365 Division I programs with a ranking high as No. 73 ranking (top 20%) by CBB Review. The Lopes' projected MW placements fell between fourth by three outlets and eighth by one metric.
T3Bracketology also put out its first NCAA Tournament seeding projection and included GCU as one of the No. 10 seeds. It also had San Diego State and No. 6, Boise State as a No. 11.
San Diego State received 74 voting points in preseason AP Top 25 voting to be the third team on the outside.
GCU lost 79-74 in a Friday exhibition game at Baylor, where Williams was held out for precautionary health reasons. The Lopes will play USC in a final exhibition game on Oct. 25 at Global Credit Union Arena before opening the regular season with a Nov. 3 home game against Purdue Fort Wayne.
"Last year, we kind of had an idea what we were going to get from some of our guys," GCU head coach Bryce Drew said. "This year, we learned a lot from watching these guys to go back to practice. That's one of the reasons I wanted to play so early, so we could see stuff and then we've got two weeks before USC that we can make some adjustments."
The MW coaches and media preseason polls will be revealed as part of MW Media Day in Las Vegas on Oct. 23. San Diego State, Utah State and Boise State were the conference programs consistently projected ahead of GCU. Here is a look at others' rankings:
Projections for GCU men's basketball |
||
| Outlet | National rank (of 365) | Mountain West rank (of 12) |
| KenPom | 80 | 5 |
| EvanMiya | 75 | 4 |
| Haslametrics | 93 | 8 |
| Torvik | 77 | 4 |
| College Sports Madness | 88 | 6 |
| The Resource Nexus | 94 | 6 |
| College Basketball Unchartered | 81 | 5 |
| CBB Review | 73 | 4 |
Players Mentioned
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