The Bat Cave

Top 25

1. Duke (15-1) [1]
2. Michigan (16-1) [2]
3. Louisville (15-1) [3]
4. Indiana (15-1) [5]
5. Kansas (14-1) [6]
6. Arizona (15-1) [4]

Comments: Nothing much changes at the top. I’d be pretty surprised and highly amused if Duke isn’t #1 when I wake up tomorrow. The remaining undefeated teams (Duke, Michigan, and Arizona) all lost, so some non-thinking voters might automatically move Louisville into the #1 spot, but that’s absurd. Considering my top 6 all have only one loss, you still have to take a look at which team has been best up to this point and Duke is still #1. The Blue Devils are #1 in RPI, #2 in strength of schedule (SoS), and boast three wins over teams with a top 5 ranking. Not only does Duke boast the better resume, but they already beat Louisville in a non-conference match up. Michigan and Louisville is a bit closer, but I’m giving the slight edge to Michigan because they’ve beat two teams currently in my top 16 (NC State and Kansas State). Finally, Arizona drops to #6 with the loss to Oregon this week.

7. Syracuse (16-1) [7]
8. Gonzaga (16-1) [9]
9. Minnesota (15-2) [8]
10. Florida (12-2) [10]
11. Creighton (16-1) [12]
12. Butler (14-2) [13]

Comments: No drastic changes here. Syracuse hasn’t really been challenged; they’ve only played two games against top 50 teams. Minnesota drops a tad after losing a close game to Indiana, but the Golden Gophers still have a top 10 resume and actually have been more impressive than Syracuse and Gonzaga. It’ll be interesting to see how high Creighton climbs in the national rankings as they could easily go undefeated in the Missouri Valley Conference.

13. North Carolina State (14-2) [15]
14. New Mexico (15-2) [16]
15. San Diego State (14-2) [17]

Comments: NC State has made a rapid climb back up my rankings. It’s easy to forget they were ranked #6 in the preseason, so pulling off the upset against Duke yesterday really isn’t all that shocking. New Mexico is still underrated nationally–they were #25 in the AP Poll and unranked in the ESPN poll respectively–but the Lobos are top 15 in both RPI and SoS and their “bad” loss was against South Dakota State (#81 in RPI). More importantly, New Mexico is 3-0 against ranked teams this year.

16. Kansas State (13-2) [22]
17. Miami (12-3) [UR]
18. Missouri (12-3) [11]
19. Notre Dame (14-2) [21]

Comments: Kansas State makes a big jump after most of my top 25 teams lost last week. KSU has played a relatively weak schedule so far (only 5 games against top 100 teams) but have performed admirably in big games so far. Miami makes a huge jump this week. The Hurricanes boast a #5 RPI ranking and now rank #1 in SoS and have 7 wins over top 100 teams, including a win this past week at North Carolina. It took me a while to appreciate what Miami has accomplished this year because of losses to Florida Gulf Coast and Indiana State, but both of those teams actually rank in the RPI top 100. Missouri drops 7 spots after a surprising loss to Ole Miss. I still think Notre Dame is the weakest team currently in my top 25, but 5 of their next 6 games are against some of the weaker teams in the Big East, so they will likely stick around a bit longer.

20. Connecticut (12-3) [UR]
21. Ohio State (13-3) [UR]
22. Michigan State (14-3) [UR]

Comments: Welcome back! All three of these teams have been in my rankings at one time this year and deserve to be back. I’ve been a big Ohio State hater so far and they had done very little to prove me wrong until they beat Michigan today, a team I was ready to give my #1 ranking come Monday.

23. Illinois (14-4) [14]
24. Cincinnati (14-3) [19]
25. UNLV (14-3) [18]

Comments: Illinois is the only four loss team in my top 25 and they’ve been quite confusing. After posting wins over Butler, Gonzaga, and beating Ohio State by 20 and looking like a legitimate top 10 team, Illinois has scuffled to a 1-3 start in the Big Ten and had back-to-back 20 point losses this past week. That’s some pretty inconsistent information. I’m giving them the benefit of the doubt for now because of three very high quality wins. UNLV is hanging on by the skin of their teeth and they won’t be nationally ranked tomorrow, but this team has done well enough without Mike Moser that I think they will be a top 20 team by the end of the year.

Dropped Out:

20. Wichita State (15-2) [20]
23. Georgetown (11-3) [23]
24. Oklahoma State (11-4) [24]
25. Wyoming (13-1) [25]

Bubble Rising:

Marquette (12-3)
Oklahoma (11-3)
Ole Miss (13-2)
Oregon (14-2)
UCLA (13-3)
VCU (14-3)

Maintaining:

North Carolina (11-4)
Pittsburgh (13-4)
Temple (11-4)

Bubble Bursting:

Colorado (11-5)
Kentucky (10-5)