2012 Winners

1) Kentucky (347 pts)

#1 Nerlens Noel

#8 Alex Poythress

#10 Archie Goodwin

#38 Willie Cauley

Last year the Wildcats make RSCI history by being the first team to ever finish first three years in a row. With three top 10’s in this class go ahead and make it four now. Don’t bet against #5...

2) Arizona (324 pts)

#7 Kaleb Tarczewski

#11 Grant Jarrett

#15 Brandon Ashley

#47 Gabe York

Sean Miller scored big with a monster class of no less than three future pro bigs.

3) UCLA (317 pts)

#1 Shabazz Muhammad

#3 Kyle Anderson

#24 Tony Parker

#59 Jordan Adams

Some services have UCLA with the top class but the RSCI calculus disagrees. Still, with Muhammad (tied for #1 with Noel) plus Anderson the Briuns have two dynamite top 5’s to lead a talented supporting cast.

4) North Carolina (221 pts)

#28 Marcus Paige

#40 Brice Johnson

#57 J.P. Tokoto

#58 Joel James

Not a lot of high end talent in this class by lofty Tarheel standards but Paige should plug right into the starting PG slot and the others should be solid contributors while they learn the system.

5) NC State (216 pts)

#17 Rodney Purvis

#27 T.J. Warren

#43 Tyler Lewis

Mark Gottfried turned things around in Raleigh in year one leading the Wolfpack to their first Sweet 16 since 2005 and then managed to bring in the best class of freshman NCSU has seen in a decade.

6) Baylor (202 pts)

#3 Isaiah Austin

#32 Ricardo Gathers

#66 L.J. Rose

Austin is a highly skilled big man who should be a star from day 1. A strong supporting cast of Gathers and Rose should only make him better.

7) Indiana (184 pts)

#25 Kevin “Yogi” Ferrell

#44 Jeremy Hollowell

#50 Hanner Perea

Ron Patterson

Peter Jurkin

The Hoosiers are back in big way with a top 5 preseason projection based in part on the strength of this incoming class.

8) UNLV (179 pts)

#6 Anthony Bennett

#36 Katin Reinhardt

#82 Savon Goodman

The Rebs made a strong push at the end bringing in Bennett and a very late commitment from Goodman to push them into the top 10.

9) Michigan (185 pts)

#23 Glenn Robinson III

#26 Mitch McGary

#78 Nik Staustas

After a meteoric rise in the summer polls that boosted him to top 5

status, McGary had a rough landing but still managed to remain a top 25ish talent. Robinson, on the other hand rose about as much as McGary fell to give this class a lot to look forward to.

Tie 10) Providence (169 pts)

#13 Ricardo Ledo

#20 Kris Dunn

Providence has a slight edge over Duke due to having two additional commitments that don’t show up in RSCI since they are out of the top 100.

Tie 10) Duke (169 pts)

#12 Rasheed Suliamon

#21 Amile Jefferson

The late addition of Jefferson was enough to push this small but talented class into the top 10.

Honorable Mention:

  • Texas (147 pts)

  • Syracuse (143 pts)

  • Kansas (119 pts)

  • Michigan State (116 pts)

  • Houston (109 pts)

  • Villanova (103 pts)

  • Maryland (101 pts)