College basketball saw its best week yet with the early-season tournaments starting last week. Several teams saw a huge jolt in their ranking because of their play against higher-ranked opponents but some others saw significant falls because of poor play. Thanksgiving week brings more opportunity for tons of teams to skyrocket and start building their resumé early on for what’s to come in March.
|
RANK
|
TEAM
|
RECORD
|
POINTS
|
PREVIOUS
|
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Gonzaga (55) | 4-0 | 1,515 | 1 |
| 2 | UCLA (5) | 4-0 | 1,443 | 2 |
| 3 | Purdue (1) | 5-0 | 1,391 | 6 |
| 4 | Kansas | 3-0 | 1,354 | 3 |
| 5 | Duke | 5-0 | 1,225 | 7 |
| 6 | Baylor | 4-0 | 1,154 | 9 |
| 7 | Villanova | 3-2 | 1,090 | 5 |
| 8 | Texas | 3-1 | 1,083 | 8 |
| 9 | Memphis | 4-0 | 1,002 | 11 |
| T-10 | Kentucky | 3-1 | 880 | 13 |
| T-10 | Alabama | 4-0 | 880 | 14 |
| 12 | Houston | 3-0 | 861 | 15 |
| 13 | Arkansas | 3-0 | 754 | 16 |
| 14 | Illinois | 2-1 | 624 | 10 |
| 15 | Tennessee | 3-1 | 558 | 17 |
| 16 | St. Bonaventure | 5-0 | 517 | 22 |
| 17 | Arizona | 5-0 | 474 | NR |
| 18 | BYU | 4-0 | 449 | NR |
| 19 | Auburn | 3-0 | 374 | 21 |
| 20 | Michigan | 3-2 | 367 | 4 |
| 21 | Seton Hall | 3-0 | 363 | NR |
| 22 | UConn | 4-0 | 342 | 23 |
| 23 | Florida | 3-0 | 294 | 24 |
| 24 | Southern California | 3-0 | 138 | 25 |
| 25 | Xavier | 4-0 | 102 | NR |
Big East Had Massive Week but Gets Disrespected
The Big East as a whole was the talk of the college basketball world after dominating the Big 10 last week. Depaul, Seton Hall, Xavier, and others landed big upsets in the Gavitt Tip-Off games. Even with this happening, only two Big East teams (besides Villanova) got ranked and they were both put in the 20s range. Seton Hall being ranked behind Michigan after beating them is absurd. Anyone who watched that game saw that the Pirates are a top 20, if not 15, team in the country. As for Xavier, they’ve looked great all season and their six-point win over Ohio State showed us just that. Both of these teams should’ve gotten moved up a little higher in these rankings but it’s still early and we’ll have to just wait to see if they are legit.
Losses Continue to Not Matter for the Bigger Programs
Just like last week, several bigger programs lost but barely saw any sort of fall. Villanova, Illinois, and Tennessee all had pretty rough weeks but didn’t move much in the rankings, if at all. Starting with Villanova, they picked up a nice win against Tennessee but dropped one to Purdue. They’ll be fine and this is the team that we have the least to gripe about in this section but they still should’ve had a small drop.
Then there’s Illinois. They had well over 20 turnovers in a loss to an unranked Marquette team. While the Golden Eagles have looked very good, they just lost Sunday night and proved they’re a vulnerable team too. Even with this loss, Illinois only fell four spots, even though nothing about this team has looked good so far.
Looking at Tennessee, the Vols’ looked awful against Villanova but had a nice bounce-back win against North Carolina (who’s been struggling) on Sunday. However, no team that shot as poorly as they did against Villanova should rise in the ranks. They are a team with clear inconsistencies that will need to be fixed if they want to gain our respect.
What is Michigan Doing Here?
The team with the worst week of them all was the Michigan Wolverines. Michigan lost to unranked opponents Seton Hall and Arizona last week but only went down to the 20th position. Understandably, the voters made a mistake not having those two teams ranked last week but in no way did Michigan look like a top 25 program. The talent is there, sure, but the puzzle pieces have not been all aligned and this team doesn’t deserve a top 20 ranking.
Most Impressive Teams Get Their Props
The best teams of the week by a long shot were St. Bonaventure and Purdue. Both saw a significant increase in their rankings with Purdue being the highest-ranked behind the clear top two teams and St. Bonaventure rising up to a borderline top 15 team. Purdue beat a ranked North Carolina and a top 10 Villanova, getting serious recognition for it while the Bonnies reeled off wins against Clemson, Marquette, and Boise State to get up even higher.
Check us out on our socials:
Twitter: @PTSTNews and @TalkPrimeTime
Facebook Page: Prime Time Sports Talk
Join our Facebook Group: Prime Time Sports Talk
Instagram: @primetimesportstalk
Follow Charlie Parent on Twitter @Charlie_Parent
Main Image Credit: Embed from Getty Images
One Response