Did Steve Pikiell Deserve a No. 15 Ranking Among Big Ten Coaches?

Pikiell Lands at No. 15

Steve Pikiell Ranked No. 15 Among Big Ten Basketball Coaches for 2026-27. The College Basketball Report has released its rankings of all 15 Big Ten basketball coaches for the 2026-27 season. Rutgers head coach Steve Pikiell was ranked No. 15. The veteran coach is entering his 11th season as head coach of the Rutgers men’s basketball team. The last couple of years have seen the Scarlet Knights losing more games than they have won.

Recent Results Shape Perception

Pikiell received a vastly different ranking from the College Basketball Report from when he was first at Rutgers compared to his current ranking. After rebuilding the program from the ground up during his tenure as coach at Stony Brook University, he led the team to its first NCAA Tournament berth. Later at Rutgers University, he would take the program to its first NCAA Tournament in 30 years. Pikiell led the program back-to-back NCAA Tournaments in 2021 and 2022 while competing in the Big Ten Conference. For his efforts, he received the 2020 Jim Phelan National Coach of the Year Award.

After building Rutgers into an NCAA Tournament team in his early years at Rutgers, Pikiell has struggled to maintain that level of success over the last couple of years. The Scarlet Knights went 15-17 in the 2024-25 season with a young roster that included future NBA lottery picks Dylan Harper and Ace Bailey. Last year, Rutgers went 14-20 overall and 6-14 in Big Ten play.

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Rutgers Continues to Back Pikiell

Zinn stated that Rutgers had met their NIL fundraising goals for men’s basketball for the 2026-27 cycle. This will be an area in which Rutgers has fewer NIL resources than a program like Ohio State. However, the Rutgers administration’s investment in men’s basketball will be a boost to Pikiell and his staff as they rebuild the roster for the upcoming season.

Rutgers is meeting their NIL fundraising goals for men’s basketball as reported by NJ Advance Media. In addition to bringing in more NIL funds, the extra dollars will enable Pikiell to better scour the country for high school players, to put together a solid recruiting class, and to search for quality transfers to bolster his roster.

Rutgers’ roster will undergo a drastic change this offseason as the program said goodbye to NBA Draft entrants Dylan Harper and Ace Bailey. The two NBA lottery picks went to the San Antonio Spurs and Utah Jazz, respectively, as they were both selected in the first round of the 2025 NBA Draft: Harper No. 2 overall to the Spurs and Bailey No. 5 overall to the Jazz.

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Pikiell has also faced changes in his coaching staff as the Rutgers men’s basketball team has a new general manager. Robert Sullivan is the new general manager for the program, and Pikiell will go along with him in putting together a roster of mostly young players, including a group of freshmen as well as some transfer students and players from around the world. The focus this offseason has been on developing the team’s defensive unit and attempting to make Rutgers a more physical basketball team.

What It Means for Rutgers

The ranking given to Pikiell at 15 reflects Rutgers’ lack of success the last couple of years on the court. However, the increased support of NIL and the veteran coaching staff Pikiell has assembled around him will be looked at to see if the program is heading back in the right direction this year.