Who could build college basketball's next dynasty? – 247Sports

Dynasties are built with consistent excellence. Fabulous recruiting classes stacked one on top of each other like grandma’s blueberry pancakes. Excellent facilities that keep getting invested into year after year. Elite player-development chops that usher hoopers into the NBA at the right time. Genuine connections throughout the coaching industry to find that next assistant who can step up when yours gets poached.
You need all of it.
Oh, and a mountain of luck.
Everything in college basketball might be changing. California is going to play in the ACC next year. Casual. UCLA and USC are going to compete with Maryland and Rutgers for the Big Ten crown. Normal stuff. Mike Krzyzewski, Jay Wright, Jim Boeheim and Roy Williams have all retired which has ushered in big changes at some of the biggest brands in the sport. Yet, the absurd randomness of the NCAA Tournament remains a yearly constant like a steadying comfort of pure, undiluted chaos.
Those seven months of preparation and five months of games go out the door when a team hears its name on Selection Sunday. Sure, the paths are more arduous for some than others, but if you avoid or survive the First Four, everyone has the same objective: Finding some way to win six games against six different opponents, sometimes using six unique ways to win each do-or-die, 40-minute cage match.
The randomness and wealth of spread-out talent have largely eliminated dynasties in college basketball. My Chicago Bulls aren’t here to win three in a row not once, but twice. College basketball doesn’t have a 2017 Golden State Warriors-like roster that has Kevin Durant, Steph Curry, Draymond Green and Klay Thompson and will simply annihilate literally anybody who dares to step into the arena with ‘em.
Billy (not Trilly) Donovan’s Florida Gators went back-to-back in 2006 and 2007. Coach K’s Dukies went back-to-back in 1991 and 1992. 50 years ago, John Wooden and UCLA won its seventh straight title. No one will ever do that again.
Repeating is harder now than ever. It might be impossible in a new era of college basketball that’s dominated by the transfer portal. Four-year plans? Yeah, right. Those got tossed in the trash. It’s year-by-year roster construction now. Building a sustainable winner might not lead to titles in back-to-back years but assembling rosters who can compete for a title every single year despite plenty of new faces could be the barometer for a true dynasty now.

The COVID-19 pandemic canceling the 2020 NCAA Tournament still looms large over the sport like the smell of rancid fish. What would Dayton be right now if that Obi Toppin and Jalen Crutcher-led team got a chance to make a run? How differently would we feel about San Diego State? The Aztecs made the National Championship game last year, but they were 30-2 in 2020 before the Big Dance got axed. Kansas won the title in 2022, but Bill Self had a roster that could’ve won it in 2020, too. Gonzaga and Baylor did as well; they had to settle for a rendezvous in the National Championship game the following year. Does a taste of the NCAA Tournament in 2020 give a loaded Illinois roster that earned a No. 1 seed in 2021 a better chance to run the table?
Oh, what could have been.

In the modern era, Kansas’ Bill Self and Gonzaga’s Mark Few have built the closest thing to a dynasty. Kansas’ reign of dominance in the loaded Big 12 speaks for itself. Self has two National Championships and double-digit, 30-win seasons. If that isn’t a dynasty, what is?
Gonzaga doesn’t have the National Championship, but the year-after-year triumphs are impossible to ignore. Gonzaga has finished No. 1 or No. 2 on KenPom in five of the past seven seasons. It’s a Goliath. It has dominated in the NCAA Tournament, advancing to the second weekend in eight consecutive tournaments. Even Kansas can’t say that. Conference realignment rumors are swirling around Gonzaga joining the Big East or the Big 12, but the Zags have no plans to quit losing.
Gonzaga doesn’t have the titles yet, but it has everything else. Duke had a rebuilding year. So did Kentucky. So did North Carolina. So did Purdue. Tom Izzo keeps leading Michigan State into the NCAA Tournament, but it hasn’t been a true contender for the title for a few years. Maybe that will change this year.
You get the point. Others take PTO. Gonzaga hasn’t. It has given itself the best chance to have multiple bites at the apple in the most unique, random, unforgiving playoff format in all of sports.
Few and Self have built the golden standard.
Is there anyone else? The odds of another dynasty emerging are exceptionally formidable, but what if it happened? Who could be the next coach to engineer the subsequent Sultan of Swat?
Let’s dive in:
At 68, Kelvin Sampson is one of the older coaches in the country, but he keeps adapting to the modern times flawlessly. Houston has finished in the top-5 on KenPom in three straight seasons. It’s advanced to the second weekend in each of the last four tournaments that have been played. Houston is stepping up into the Big 12, but that might help Sampson get even stronger. Houston has strong resources that it wisely uses in the transfer portal to attract top talent. Playing for Sampson is not easy, but you get better. Jarace Walker’s family wanted him to go to a place where he would be coached hard and actually developed, not just get shots and stats. He did just that at Houston and flourished into a first-round pick. Sampson has built his program around retention and development. The Cougars haven’t won a National Championship yet, but they’ve been on the verge for three years in a row.
Sampson is getting older but he’s only getting stronger. Houston is one of the most well-respected programs in the country.
Duke is not a dynasty yet, but this could be the beginning of the surge. Jon Scheyer’s recruiting chops are unmatched. He built the No. 1-rated Class of 2022. He inked the No. 2-rated Class of 2023. Cooper Flagg, a generational No. 1 prospect in the Class of 2024, is already on the way. Duke could be in the process of building the internet era’s best-ever recruiting class in 2024.
Scheyer just has to win.
Duke’s roster is teeming with NBA talent, and all Scheyer has to do is press the right buttons. Duke might have the best team in the country with the best prospect in the country entering the fold next year. The Brotherhood is in phenomenal shape with Scheyer leading the charge. If the recruiting prowess shows up on the floor, Duke is well-positioned to be a flat-out problem both now and in the years to come.
It’s UConn’s turn (again) to try and etch its name in history and become just the third program in the last five decades to repeat. Dan Hurley built a terrifying roster that steamrolled through the Big Dance last year. Three captains (and NBA players) are gone, but UConn might have the most NBA talent of any roster in the country. Enormous center Donovan Clingan and five-star guard Stephon Castle could be first-round picks next year. UConn has a bunch of talent waiting in the wings who should only get better thanks to Hurley’s fabulous player-development program.
The Big East is an absolute wagon, and the Huskies are a bit young. But when the Big Dance rolls around, UConn will likely be a team no one wants to draw. Hurley has elevated UConn’s brand on the recruiting trail and in the transfer portal in a major way. The window is now to make history.
Eric Musselman is one of the most aggressive roster-builders in the country. Roster turnover is difficult for some other coaches to adjust to, but it’s a way of life for Musselman. He’ll load up with transfer after transfer if he believes that will give him the best shot to win. He’ll double-down on five-star freshmen if he believes that will give him the best shot to win. It, truly, does not matter.
He keeps backing it up in March.
Arkansas has advanced to the second weekend in three of Musselman’s first four seasons. Arkansas hasn’t won an SEC Championship yet under Musselman, but it’s hard to find another coach who has his team ready to roll in March. Musselman still has to keep recruiting at an elite level, but he’s built Arkansas into a national brand by being himself. Both the good and the not-so-good. Arkansas hasn’t made it to the Final Four yet, but it certainly feels inevitable at this point and then anything can happen.
Scott Drew is one of the elite coaches in the country. Baylor’s National Championship in 2021 was the ultimate scale-the-mountain moment Drew deserved and needed. But it could’ve been even more special. Baylor’s 2019-20 squad was phenomenal, too, and Drew didn’t get to see the fruit of his labor in the Big Dance.
Back-to-back, second-round exits have taken a bit of the shine off Drew, but Baylor’s draws the last two years have been a bit unlucky. North Carolina had way more talent than a casual No. 8 seed in 2022. Creighton had a No. 6 seed next to its name last year, but it was a phenomenal roster that could’ve easily been a No. 3 seed if All-Big East center Ryan Kalkbrenner didn’t miss a bunch of time with a bout of mono.
You get the memo.
Weird things happen in March.
Drew is still one of college basketball’s top-tier coaches who keeps recruiting well and pulling in the right transfers. What Drew has built at Baylor is tremendous. He can elevate his status in more ways than one in the years to come.
Mick Cronin has been on both sides of the March Madness luck coin.
In 2021, it took a bit of luck for the Bruins to emerge from the First Four and make it all the way to the Final Four as a No. 11 seed. It flipped the other way when Jalen Suggs banked in a bomb to stun UCLA in a classic Final Four war.
If Jaime Jaquez Jr.’s ankles weren’t tattered and splintered, UCLA likely knocks off North Carolina in 2022 and would’ve had a date with No. 15 seed Saint Peter’s with a berth to a second-straight Final Four in its grasp.
If Adem Bona and Jaylen Clark are healthy, UCLA had the roster to win the National Championship last year. It still took a Julian Strawther heave to knock the Bruins out in the Sweet 16. (Not getting full-strength UCLA vs. full-strength UConn last year is a travesty that I might not ever recover from.)
Cronin had three, real shots to win the National Championship and got nothing out of it. Brutal.
The Bruins head to the Big Ten next year, but that should only help UCLA have even more resources to pour into the program. Cronin plans to make international recruiting a huge piece of UCLA’s roster-building habits moving forward. The talent throughout the world is excellent, and UCLA is well-positioned to be an alpha in those waters.
Cronin won’t build UCLA into a John Wooden-like dynasty, but the Bruins have no excuse to not be extremely relevant moving forward in the ever-changing space.
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