2026-27 CBS Sports Preseason All-America Teams: Thomas Haugh, Jeremy Fears Jr., Tyran Stokes among top stars

Three teams, 15 players, the best ballers in college hoops to know before the season tips on Nov. 1 For all of the debates tied to revenue-sharing, big NIL deals, loosened eligibility rules, transfer-waivers and the supposed "chaos" those things have combined to bring to college athletics, there's no denying that changes to the system, dramatic as they might be, are keeping elite talent in school longer. In any other era of the sport, players like Florida's Thomas Haugh, Vanderbilt's Tyler Tanner, Texas Tech's JT Toppin and Virginia Thijs De Ridder, just to name a few, would no longer be in college — and De Ridder probably would've never even enrolled considering he's a former professional from Belgium.

As it is, though, each of them is an established college star who has passed on professional opportunities to either enroll in school or stay in school (or both), and they were all voted by a panel of writers and analysts to one of the three 2026-27 CBS Sports preseason All-America teams. Haugh and Tanner, among the favorites to be SEC Player of the Year, were joined on the FIrst Team by Michigan State point guard Jeremy Fears Jr., Kansas freshman Tyran Stokes and Illinois sophomore David Mirkovic. That means 40% of the First Team comes from either the Big Ten or