COLBY, Kan. – For the third-straight year, the Johnson County Community College men’s basketball team has been picked to win the 2025-26 Kansas Jayhawk Community College Conference Division 2 Men’s Basketball regular season title in the league’s annual predicted order of finish.

Following a vote of all seven D2 men’s basketball head coaches in the league, the Cavaliers received 48 points and six out of seven first-place votes to defend their 2024-25 regular season title. JCCC went a perfect 14-0 last season in the KJCCC to claim their ninth KJCCC regular season title in program history and second unbeaten record in conference play before finishing as NJCAA Region 6 Tournament runners-up and NJCAA National Tournament eighth-place finisher.

Picked to finish second is reigning NJCAA Region 6 Tournament Champions Kansas City Kansas Community College as the Blue Devils received 39 total points and were picked to finish no lower than third by any of the seven coaches in the league after earning their second trip to the NJCAA National Tournament in program history. KCKCC went 1-2 at the National Tournament in Danville, Illinois last year, picking up an 88-82 win over Raritan Valley in the first round before losses to Kirkwood Community College and Johnson County to end their season with a 26-10 overall record.

Following KCKCC and picked to finish third is Highland Community College as the Scotties earned 34 total points in the poll and will look to build off last year’s third-place finish in the final KJCCC regular season standings and appearance in the NJCAA Region 6 Tournament semifinals, where they fell to eventual tournament champion KCKCC. Tied for fourth in the poll are both Fort Scott and Allen, with the Greyhounds receiving the lone remaining first-place vote as both teams received 26 total points. Neosho County was picked sixth (15 points), along with Labette (eight points), which rounded out the poll in seventh.

All seven league teams will open their season during the opening weekend of the season as the 2025-26 season will begin on Friday, October 31st with five games taking place among conference schools. Non-conference action will take place throughout the opening two months of the season before seeing KJCCC play begin on Wednesday, January 14th with six teams playing across three games to kick off a 12-game home-and-home double-round-robin conference schedule against one another.

The 2026 NJCAA Region 6 Tournament will begin on Tuesday, March 3rd with the tournament’s top seed receiving a first-round bye into the semifinal round while teams seeded second, third, and fourth will host the bottom three teams in the final regular season standings for the right to advance to the semifinal round. The semifinals and finals will take place March 6-7 on the campus of Kansas City Kansas Community College inside the KCKCC Field House with the NJCAA Division 2 Men’s Basketball National Tournament slated to take place March 16-21, 2026, in Danville, Illinois.