While matchups against the likes of UConn and Kentucky will draw the bulk of the attention this fall for the Kansas men’s basketball team, they only make up about half the nonconference schedule.
The Jayhawks will both open and close their nonleague slate against mid-major foes at Allen Fieldhouse, facing six such opponents overall.
Here’s a look at what to expect from each of those relatively unfamiliar teams — Fordham, Middle Tennessee State, Denver, Northern Iowa, Indiana State and New Orleans — when they make the trip to Lawrence this fall.
(Note that KU has one additional mid-major on the schedule, UNLV, but it’s in Las Vegas, the Rebels’ hometown, as part of the Players Era tournament.)
Fordham (Nov. 2): When the Rams travel to Lawrence for the season opener, it will be their first game in Allen Fieldhouse since 1977. KU is 4-1 in its history against Fordham, which in its previous regime committed recruiting violations and also had players who committed sports betting violations. But the Rams have turned over a new leaf and went 17-15 (8-10 Atlantic 10) in their first year under former UC Riverside head coach Mike Magpayo, a five-win improvement.
Fordham returns several key players from last season, headlined by a pair of international frontcourt starters in German forward Rikus Schulte (10.7 points, 9.1 rebounds per game) and Japanese forward Akira Jacobs (7.2 points, 4.8 boards). The guard position will have a new transfer-heavy look with John Laboy II (a reserve at Miami), Amir Lindsey (17.9 points at Albany) and Lateef Patrick (15.2 points at Stephen F. Austin). Magpayo also added 24-year-old Croatian pro Vito Kučić.
Middle Tennessee State (Nov. 6): The Blue Raiders will face KU in both football and men’s basketball this season. KU has won all three meetings with MTSU on the hardwood, with the most recent in Lawrence in 2000. The program is consistently among the top few schools in Conference USA, but veteran head coach Nick McDevitt has not yet led the Blue Raiders to an NCAA Tournament. Last year they too went 17-15 (11-9 C-USA).
The duo of Torey Alston and Kamari Lands that guided last year’s team is gone, leaving former Penn State guard and part-time starter Jahvin Carter, who averaged 10.8 points and led the team in assists, as the top returner. Serbian center Luka Jovanovic is also back after coming off the bench as a freshman and will be joined in the post by the likes of JUCO standout Kaleb Siler and sporadically used forward Jarred Hall.
Guard Quintero Barnett averaged 14.6 points per game on 41.4% 3-point shooting last season at Division II Walsh, while Tennessee native Eli Rice joins on the wing after time at Nebraska and Penn State. Other transfers include guard Kevin de Kovachich (North Alabama) and forward Ofri Naveh (Oral Roberts).
Denver (Nov. 23): For an unusually timed game on the Monday of Thanksgiving week, KU will host the Pioneers, who once beat the Jayhawks in Lawrence in 1958 but are 1-3 overall in four games against them, with the most recent coming in 1962.
Denver, which rose to Division I in the late 1990s, has not made the NCAA Tournament in its history. Tim Bergstraser, formerly of Minnesota State-Moorhead, took over the program beginning last year, when the Pioneers went 15-17 and tied for fourth at 8-8 in the Summit League. They are now moving to the West Coast Conference.
Denver has something that eludes many mid-major teams these days, which is a returning star. Carson Johnson, who as a freshman at Moorhead during the 2024-25 season burned his redshirt and ended up leading the team in scoring, followed Bergstraser to Denver and as a sophomore averaged 20.1 points per game, shooting 41.4% from deep on high volume, and was the Summit League player of the year.
The Pioneers did lose almost everyone else from last season outside of fellow Moorhead holdover Shaun Wysocki, a 6-foot-7 forward with five starts in 30 appearances. The new, eclectic roster features transfers such as wing Jordan Rogers (a starter at NJIT last year), 6-foot-9 Australian forward Harry Bates (Temple College) and a host of rotational players primarily drawn from other mid-majors.
Northern Iowa (Dec. 1): The program that famously upset KU in the 2010 NCAA Tournament was led by head coach Ben Jacobson for 20 seasons before he left for Utah State this spring. The Panthers, who will come to Lawrence for the first time since 1973, hired Kyle Green, who had three stints as a UNI assistant but had most recently been at Iowa State under T.J. Otzelberger.
The coaching change has resulted in minimal year-over-year roster continuity for UNI, which made the NCAA Tournament last season after an impressive run through the Missouri Valley tournament as the No. 6 seed, only to (like KU) lose to St. John’s in San Diego. UNI does not return eight of its top nine players in minutes per game, leaving forward Kyle Pock (3.7 points in 12.5 minutes per game with one start) and guard Geon Hutchins (1.5 points, 1.2 rebounds in 7.7 minutes) from last year.
Top acquisitions include wing Tate McCubbin, who started 54 games in two years at Austin Peay, and Greyson Uelmen, who averaged 16.8 points per game as a redshirt freshman at North Dakota.
Indiana State (Dec. 22): As much turnover as UNI might have experienced, the Sycamores’ is far more severe. ISU does not bring back a single player who spent any time on the court during the 2025-26 season, as the lone projected returnee is guard Martin Kaupanger, who redshirted.
That’s without a coaching change, but following two sub-.500 seasons under head coach Matthew Graves, after his predecessor Josh Schertz experienced a high level of success. ISU and KU will face off for the first time ever.
The headliner of the fresh roster Graves assembled this spring is Karmani Gregory, a 6-foot-1 redshirt senior guard from USC Upstate who last season led the Spartans with 15.6 points per game. EJ McQuillan scored more than 20 a game at NAIA LSU Alexandria. Greyson Pritzl, a 6-foot-4 guard from Division II Lander, shot 42.1% from deep on 242 attempts last year on a team that reached the national title game. Joining them in the backcourt are Maguire Mitchell and Meechie White, double-digit scorers at IU Indianapolis and Eastern Illinois, respectively.
The forward group will be counting on 6-foot-7 Jackson Cooper to make the jump from NAIA Oregon Tech, where he was a second-team All-American, and 6-foot-10 Alessio Calamita to make the transition from German pro ball.
New Orleans (Dec. 29): The Privateers made some noise early last season with an upset win at TCU in their season opener, but finished the year 15-18 overall, albeit with a 12-10 record in league play. Their head coach is Stacy Hollowell, a former national champion at the NAIA level. He will lead UNO — soon to be renamed LSU New Orleans — on its first trip to Allen Fieldhouse since 2005.
UNO has not yet released a 2026-27 roster, so the group it will bring to Lawrence may not be quite settled. But while the Privateers lost several key players to the transfer portal, they do seem poised to return part-time starters Enzo Boudouma (5.3 points, 3.1 rebounds per game) and Kedrick Osby (4.9 points, 2.2 boards), both forwards.
Some of their known offseason acquisitions include 6-foot-7 guard Cham Okey, who racked up 19.4 points, 8.2 rebounds and 4.5 assists at North Dakota State College of Science after starting his career at SIUE; fellow JUCO guard Yohandry Ortiz of South Plains College; Alan Shi, a 6-foot-10 forward from Overtime Elite’s Cold Hearts; and guard Kahlil Singleton, who averaged 13.9 points per game and shot 38.5% on 226 3s at Canisius.
Middle Tennessee State guard Jahvin Carter, left, drives against Houston guard Milos Uzan, right, during an NCAA college basketball game Monday, Dec. 29, 2025, in Houston.
Denver Pioneers guard Carson Johnson (20) shoot against Arizona Wildcats guard Anthony Dell’Orso (3) during the first half of an NCAA college basketball game, Monday, Nov. 24, 2025, in Tucson, Ariz.
New Orleans head coach Stacy Hollowell gestures to his athletes during the first half in an NCAA college basketball game against Texas Tech, Wednesday, Nov. 26, 2025, in Lubbock, Texas.
AP Photo/Maria Lysaker
AP Photo/Darryl Webb
AP Photo/Annie Rice