The 2025–26 Kent State Golden Flashes men's basketball team represented Kent State University during the 2025–26 NCAA Division I men's basketball season. The Golden Flashes, led by 15th-year head coach Rob Senderoff, played their home games at the Memorial Athletic and Convocation Center, also known as the MAC Center, in Kent, Ohio as members of the Mid-American Conference.

They finished the 2025–26 season 14–4 in MAC play, to finish in 3rd place. They qualified for the MAC tournament as the 3rd seed where they defeated Ohio in the quarterfinals before losing to Akron in the semifinals.

Kent State accepted an NIT bid and lost to Illinois State in the first round to finish the year 24–10 overall.

Previous season The Golden Flashes finished the 2024–25 season 24–12, 11–7 in MAC play to finish in third place. They defeated Western Michigan before losing to Miami (OH) in the semifinals of the MAC tournament. They received an invitation to the NIT, where they defeated St. Bonaventure and Stanford, before falling to Loyola Chicago in the quarterfinals.

Offseason

Departures Departures Name Number Pos. Height Weight Year Hometown Reason for departure Jonas Nichols 0 G 6'3" 206 Freshman Akron, Ohio Transferred to Northwest Florida State VonCameron Davis 1 F 6'5" 229 Senior Columbus, Ohio Graduated Marquis Barnett 2 G 6'4" 195 Senior Saginaw, Michigan Graduated Jalen Sullinger 13 G 5'10" 167 Senior Columbus, Ohio Graduated; Signed with KKS Polonia Warsaw Mike Bekelja 15 G 6'0" 184 Graduate student Solon, Ohio Graduated Anthony Morales 22 F 6'8" 195 Graduate student Boston, Massachusetts Graduated Derrick Lee Jr. 41 F 6'5" 205 Freshman Novi, Michigan Transferred to Lake Region State College Cli'Ron Hornbeak 42 C 6'9" 238 Senior Toledo, Ohio Graduated Donovan Hunter 55 F 6'8" 197 Sophomore Columbus, Ohio Transferred to Bellarmine Jaiden Pennicott G 6'2" 164 Freshman Ajax, Ontario Transferred to Palm Beach State College

Incoming transfers Incoming transfers Name Number Pos. Height Weight Year Hometown Previous school Rayvon Griffith 0 F 6'8" 205 Sophomore Cincinnati, Ohio Cincinnati Rob Whaley Jr. 2 F/C 6'7" 289 Graduate student Farmington, Utah UNLV Jahari Williamson 25 G 6'1" 193 Graduate student Pickering, Ontario Niagara

Recruiting class

Preseason On October 21, 2025, the MAC released the preseason coaches' poll. Kent State was picked to finish third in the MAC regular season.

Preseason rankings MAC preseason pollPredicted finishTeamVotes (1st place) 1 Akron 143 (11) 2 Miami (OH) 133 (2) 3 Kent State 122 4 Ohio 108 5 UMass 98 6 Toledo 95 7 Bowling Green 73 8 Ball State 62 9 Eastern Michigan 52 10 Western Michigan 46 11 Buffalo 37 12 Central Michigan 31 13 Northern Illinois14

MAC Tournament Champions: Akron (8), Miami-Ohio (2), Kent State (1), Ohio (1), UMass (1)

Source

Preseason All-MAC Preseason All-MAC teamsTeamPlayerPositionYearFirstDelrecco GillespieForwardSenior Source

Roster

Schedule and results

!colspan=12 style=""| Regular season

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Sources:

References