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Gerry Broome/Associated Press

Consistency is difficult to maintain in any sport, but it's almost impossible in college basketball. The nature of the game, with elite talent always a threat to leave for the NBA or transfer to some other school, renders any player a potential vagabond. The coaching carousel is a threat to tear away the face of any program that threatens to break into the elite.

Most of the programs that win year after year are models of stability compared to the rest of Division I. The coaches remain long enough to reach iconic status, and they're always prepared to replace a departed star with more talent to fit the system.

There's a very good reason North Carolina vs. Duke is hyped as college basketball's greatest rivalry. The two Tobacco Road giants are virtually always winning enough games to figure prominently in the national discussion, so Mike Krzyzewski and Roy Williams make natural faces for our rankings.

These 20 programs may have just begun to chart a winning path over the past 10 years, or they may be continuing to build on decades of prior excellence. Either way, they've produced some tremendous basketball over the past 10 seasons and most should be expected to continue the trend this year.

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