Stanford Men’s Basketball tips off their 2025-26 campaign on Thursday night with a home exhibition against former Pac-12 foe Oregon. This marks the Cardinal’s first exhibition game in 7 years, since Jerod Haase and KZ Okpala hosted Sonoma State, a school that no longer even sponsors an athletics program.
We are here to bring you a preseason primer so you know what to expect from year two of Kyle Smith’s tenure.
Departures
A surprise 7th place ACC finish last season saw much of the offense run through senior big man Maxime Raynaud. The All-ACC selection is now lacing them up for the Sacramento Kings after going 42nd in June’s NBA Draft. Gone are his 20 points and 10 rebounds per game, as well as senior leadership.
Grad transfer point guard Jaylen Blakes is also in the pro ranks. He’s averaging 15 points and 5 assists a game in Israel after a breakout 13 and 5 leading the Cardinal attack.
In a sense, Oziyah Sellers joined the professional ranks, too, getting pried away from Stanford by one Rick Pitino. Oziyah’s transfer to St. John’s was particularly notable as he had publicly declared that he was returning to Stanford for his senior season. Sellers put up 13.7 points in his lone season on The Farm.
Altogether, that trio made up the team’s top 3 in scoring and minutes played, as well as 3 of the top 4 rebounders and 3 of the top 5 in assists.
Returning
Stanford leads the ACC by returning 52% of its minutes played from last season, and ranks fourth in returning 37% of its points. Although the three standouts are gone, there are 11 players returning from last season. The Cardinal will not be lacking for depth.
Seniors Benny Gealer and Chisom Okpara represented the Cardinal at ACC Media Day, and are reportedly both ready to take significant scoring and leadership jumps. Benny averaged 6 points and Chisom averaged 6.5 in 2024-25. While at Harvard, Chisom averaged 16.5 as a sophomore, and he reached double figures 11 times in his debut Stanford campaign. Benny Gealer topped out with a career high of 20, and had 8 games with 3 or more made threes.
Ryan Agarwal and Jaylen Thompson enter their fourth years in the program, but as redshirt junior and sophomore, respectively. Ryan finished fourth in scoring, as well as second in both rebounds and assists last season. This offseason he worked out with Jeremy Lin, and feels ready to continue to round out his game and improve his outside shooting. Thompson had career highs of 6 points and 7 rebounds against SMU and will compete for more consistent minutes.
Aidan Cammann was a pleasant surprise last season, going from redshirting to starting nearly half the games. His calling card was defense, and he finished second on the team in blocks. This year he may see more scoring opportunities. Donavin Young was another frequent starter when healthy, and will look to build on his three-and-D potential.
Evan Stinson, Anthony Batson, and Tallis Toure each showed flashes as freshmen. Evan missed time with injury, but gave Kyle Smith good wing minutes and peaked with 10 points in a 1 point win over NC State. Anthony Batson primarily featured as a defensive specialist, averaging a team-high 4 steals and 1.6 blocks per 40 minutes. Tallis Toure blocked 3 shots in Berkeley and helped turn that game for Stanford.
Cameron Grant and Ethan Kitch return to the roster as walk-ons. Grant appeared in 10 games, including some meaningful minutes, due to his shooting and hustle. Ethan Kitch redshirted his freshman year.
Additions
The Cardinal add six fresh faces to the squad for a roster of 17 players. This is the first year with a scholarship allowance of 15, so the team likely is deeper than ever.
Ebuka Okorie figures to be a difference maker immediately. Throughout the summer, Kyle Smith has suggested Ebuka could start, and more recently he confirmed as much. Ebuka was ranked outside the top 100 in his class by many outlets, despite playing exceptional basketball in a prep school league full of D1 players. His underrating reminds me of Tyrell Terry, and if his freshman season is half as good as Ty’s, Stanford fans are in for a treat.
Oskar Giltay joins Stanford after averaging 7 points and 4 rebounds in the Belgium-Netherlands pro league as a 17 year old center. He also put up 10 points, 6 rebounds, and 3 blocks for Belgium in the U18 Euros. Oskar figures to mop up a good chunk of minutes freed by Maxime’s departure. Playing and succeeding against older players is nothing new for him. He had a 38 year old teammate last year!
Kristers Skinda may have the most long-term potential of the four freshman commits. At the U18 Euros he averaged 18 points and 10 rebounds on shooting splits of 42/44/96 as a 6’10” forward. His versatility and size are awfully compelling.
Myles Jones was a late addition to the class after reclassifying and enrolling a year early. He adds more backcourt depth to the roster. Myles was a decorated player out of Modesto. His early enrolling suggests he likely figures to play a bigger role next season.
Jeremy Dent-Smith and AJ Rohosy join the Cardinal as graduate transfers. Jeremy was a D2 All-American at Cal State-Dominguez Hills, scoring 60 points and 17 rebounds in his two Final Four games and coming a point away from a national title. Scoring is in his DNA, and Stanford will need it.
AJ joins Stanford after playing as a walk-on for Kyle Smith at Washington State before dominating the D3 ranks at Claremont-Mudd-Scripps. Judging by the practice I watched, AJ figures to play a role in the rotation and surprise a lot of folks this year. The Marin County native is ready to break out. Kyle Smith reminded me that AJ was behind a host of future NBA and NCAA stars at WSU.
What the Models Say
The Cardinal finished last season with the 7 seed in the ACC tournament, and a second round run in the NIT. They were ranked 76th nationally according to BartTorvik, 81st in KenPom, and 87th by EvanMiya. Each of those rankings also had them in 8th among all ACC teams in what was a decidedly down year for the conference.
These three sites have all released preseason rankings already. EvanMiya sees the Cardinal 7 spots higher, at 80th, but only 14th in the ACC. KenPom has them 8 spots lower at 89, and 16th in the conference. BartTorvik dropped them a full 25 spots from last year to 101, and good for 17th in the 18-team league.
All said, the Cardinal had a metric average of 81st last year, and are 90th in the preseason. The bigger issue is that finishing 7th in the ACC again will be a more difficult task, as the league pencils out as being much stronger in 2026. The models suggest another year of contending for an NIT berth, or perhaps worse, if the conference record suffers too greatly. But there are plenty of reasons to believe Stanford will overachieve their projections. They certainly did a year ago.
Why Stanford Will Overachieve
Kyle Smith has been ranked by KenPom as the 7th best coach at overperforming the analytic models. He doesn’t just put together good groups of players. He and his staff find a way to get the most out of them.
But this roster is also one for which I firmly believe the analytic models are not well prepared. They put great weight in the 10 returning contributors from a year ago. But these models are not well equipped to account for transfers from outside of D-1, like Jeremy Dent-Smith and AJ Rohosy. Both players figure to be contributors.
Additionally, the word out of the program is that Ebuka Okorie has been impressive and will be a day one starter. He is likely to dramatically outperform his recruiting ranking. and thus his metric projections. I expect freshman center Oskar Giltay to do the same, as he rates well in my proprietary Global Plus-Minus model, accounting for his professional and national team experiences in Europe. Kristers Skrinda is another player likely to be overlooked by these analytics.
When you consider Stanford has five new players who have a better than likely chance at outplaying their projections, and a coach known for shattering expectations, I fully expect the Cardinal to contend for a middle of the pack finish in the ACC again. And with a stronger conference, that may even mean enough quality wins to go dancing.