If you’re having serious doubts about the UK men’s basketball team after watching the Cats lose to Ole Miss on Tuesday, Luke Winn has a story on SI.com that may lift your spirits. Winn includes Kentucky in his “Magic Eight.” The Magic Eight, as Winn describes it, “is not a list of the eight best teams in college basketball, nor is it a prediction of the Elite Eight.” Winn calls the eight teams “merely a pool of teams that’s guaranteed to include the national champ.”In other words, Winn thinks Kentucky is one of only eight teams capable of winning it all. Here’s what Winn has to say about UK:

Of the teams that already rank in the top five efficiency-wise, the Wildcats have the most upside. Their two highest-usage freshmen, hybrid forward Terrence Jones and point guard Brandon Knight, have yet to hit their peak, and junior leader Darius Miller has been surging in his past five games. They fit the teams-with-NBA-talent-win-titles formula — Jones and Knight, at the very least, have a future in the league — and they’re a much better shooting team than the loaded club that went ice-cold in last season’s Elite Eight.

It should be noted that Winn’s evaluation and the publication of the story was before UK’s loss in Oxford, Miss.The other teams making the list were BYU, Duke, Georgetown, Ohio State, Texas, Tennessee and Washington. Notice some marquee teams missing?Check on Winn’s full story at SI.com to read more about the Magic Eight and who didn’t make Winn’s list.