Juve Stabia is among the 20 teams in Serie B 2026-2027. The new grid has been officially announced. Padova is aiming to be an outsider. The final playoff of Serie C won by Ascoli against Brescia has closed the season of Italian professional football and simultaneously defined the organization of the next Serie B. These will be the 20 participants in the 2026/27 cadet tournament: Arezzo, Ascoli, Avellino, Benevento, Carrarese, Catanzaro, Cesena, Cremonese, Empoli, Hellas Verona, Juve Stabia, Mantova, Modena, Padova, Palermo, Pisa, Sampdoria, Südtirol, Vicenza and Virtus Entella. It is still too early to define a grid of favorites and much will depend on the market trend. Good or bad, however, the ambitions of almost all participants are already known and once again it can be reiterated a concept that has accompanied the last Serie B championships: a very uncertain and balanced tournament is announced. Even more than the last season, when all the verdicts were decided in the last two days. The confirmation comes from the pedigree that accompanies the four promoted teams from Serie C. For the first time in five years, the playoffs were won by a second-placed team in the regular season and at the end the verdicts respected the predictions of the beginning of the season. No great surprise, indeed, four of the nine teams with the highest wage among the 60 of Serie C made the jump. In short, all four promoted teams seem to be equipped to attenuate the change of category without shocks. Regarding adaptation to the category: from Serie A have descended two habitués of the last Serie B championships like Cremonese and Pisa, for which the adventure in the Olympus of Italian football has lasted the flash of a season. But precisely for this reason both seem to be ready to try again immediately the ascent, on the heels of what happened in the last championship at Venice and Monza (returned to Serie A just one year after relegation) but also at Frosinone, absent from Serie A since 2024. The only team that was missing for a longer time is Hellas Verona, whose last journey in B dates back to 2018/19. But it will be hard not to insert the scaligeri in the number of favorites for promotion, together with the other two re-promoted teams and the big disappointed in the last championship like Palermo and Sampdoria. Immediately behind can insinuate a group of rising teams, in which also Padova wants to insert itself, and which will certainly count on Modena, Cesena, Catanzaro and Avellino. At a geographical level, the map of the championship does not change much, even if compared to the last season the center of gravity shifts a bit more towards central Italy. The most represented region is Tuscany, which will be able to count on four participants: Empoli and Carrarese have joined Pisa and Arezzo. The latter is the society that has been missing from Serie B for 20 years. Behind it, two regions place three representatives, Campania with Benevento which joins Juve Stabia and Avellino, and Veneto.