The Illinois basketball class of 2026 was already pretty special, but after an update, we are looking at one of the best classes in the country.
What Brad Underwood did with the Illini class of 2025 last season was special. On paper, it wasn’t anything to write home about, but on the court, that group was the driving force in a Final Four appearance.
Illinois’ class of 2026 is different. It has massive expectations. Those expectations have been ratcheted up a bit after 247Sports updated their rankings on Thursday.
After the update, Illinois now sits with the No. 6 freshman class in the country. Since we only have one transfer portal addition, that number brings down our overall ranking.
Among the freshman class, Quentin Coleman was always the lead dog. He was always the top commit and now signee. But what 247Sports did on Thursday was take Coleman from a great addition to a level Illinois fans have rarely seen.
Coleman entered Thursday as the No. 35 player in the class of 2026. I would have been happy with that number entering his freshman season. In the blink of an eye, that all changed. Coleman is now the No. 13 player in the class of 2026. On top of that, he is up there with the best of the best five-star recruits.
Just having a five-star recruit coming into the program is a big deal. You can count the five-star players who have suited up for Illinois on one hand, that is how rare it is for one to be in Champaign. Coleman is a part of that special group.
On top of Coleman being a five-star, 247Sports now has him as the second-highest-ranked recruit Illinois has landed in the rankings era. This spans to the early 2000s.
The only player currently ahead of Coleman all-time is Will Riley. The 247Sports Composite ratings have Riley at 0.9951 and Coleman at .9944. Think about that for a second. Coleman is ranked ahead of a player like Ayo Dosunmu.
There is a familiar trend with the top recruits Underwood has signed. Riley, Morez Johnson Jr., and Dosunmu are the top three right now. Riley and Dosunmu are in the NBA, and Johnson is going to be a first round pick here in about a month. Coleman is now joining that group, so he could easily be next.
Quentin Coleman can’t have all of the fun when it comes to Illinois basketball players seeing a boost in recruiting rankings
It is incredible to see Coleman shoot up the charts that much. He is a special talent, and he showed that at the Iverson Classic in the past month. But he wasn’t the only one who saw a nice bump in recruiting ranking.
Lucas Morillo went from No. 60 to No. 52 in the country. One of the biggest jumps you will see is from Zavier Zens. He was the No. 212 player in the class of 2026, and now he is the No. 124 player in the country and a four-star recruit.
The future is incredibly bright for the Illinois basketball program. We didn’t need to see a recruiting update to know that the talent coming in was going to be special. The fact that we now have one of the highest-rated players in program history is fun. The next step is to get that talent to translate onto the court. Let the games begin.
Add us as a preferred source on Google