Last Sunday night, on an episode of the Eye On College Basketball Podcast, I told my colleague Matt Norlander in passing that this 2018-19 Nevada team reminded me some of the 2007-08 Memphis team that started the season 26-0 and played for the national championship.

Here's what I meant: That Memphis team, which was built outside of the normal power structure of the sport by a former NBA coach (John Calipari), brought back three of the top four scorers from a 33-win team that won its league's regular-season title by multiple games and advanced to the second weekend of the NCAA Tournament. It then added a five-star freshman (Derrick Rose) and quickly became an obvious contender to win a national championship. Similarly, this Nevada team, which was built outside of the normal power structure of the sport by a former NBA coach (Eric Musselman), brought back three of the top four scorers from a 29-win team that won its league's regular-season title by multiple games and advanced to the second weekend of the NCAA Tournament. It then added a five-star freshman (Jordan Brown) and has quickly become an obvious contender to win a national championship.

To be clear, I'm not comparing Jordan Brown to Derrick Rose.

That's silly.

But if this Nevada team starts 26-0 like that Memphis team started 26-0 it won't surprise me in the least, if only because Nevada figures to overwhelm just about everybody in the Mountain West Conference the same way Memphis used to overwhelm just about everybody in Conference USA. For what it's worth, KenPom currently gives the Wolf Pack at least a 77-percent chance to win every individual game left on its regular-season schedule, and it projects Nevada to be a double-digit favorite in 20 of its next 23 games -- among them Friday night's showdown with Arizona State.

KenPom's projected score for that one?

Wolf Pack 83, Sun Devils 73.

Nevada is No. 5 in Friday morning's updated Top 25 And 1. Arizona State is No. 21. They're the only currently-ranked teams scheduled to play Friday.

Friday's Top 25 And 1