Week 15 NCAA College Basketball Top 25
Before I get into this week’s rankings, I just want to express my condolences to Fab Melo’s family and loved ones. Fab Melo was a great college basketball player for Syracuse during some of the first years that I was following the sport. He was an elite rim protector for Cuse at the time and he helped them earn a #1 seed in 2012 march madness tournament. His potential as a rim protecting center earned him a first round draft pick by the Boston Celtics. You are probably aware that I am a Celtics fan based on the abundance of Boston sports articles we have posted and I was amped when we drafted Fab. He may not have panned out as a Celtic, but it still saddened me to hear the news of his death on saturday. Rest in Peace to one of the first great college players I had the pleasure to watch.
Fairly uneventful week besides rivalry night. UNC sadly lost to Duke and UCLA made an insane comeback to take down Oregon. Let’s just get into it.
#1 Gonzaga: Zaga is starting to silence the haters because they have improved to 26-0, including a huge win against Saint Mary’s on saturday. Some might say Saint Mary’s is also a product of being is a bad conference but saying it wasn’t a good win would be false. They are unlikely to lose again from now until the tourney.
#2 Villanova: Nova picked up their first good win in a while this week when they took down Xavier. The conference rivals had been anticipating this game but Nova ultimately come through and got the job done. No movement for them though.
#3 Kansas: The Jayhawks are continuing to get the job done by adding two more wins against Kansas St and Texas Tech. They did however nearly lose to both teams so I’m interested to see how they play West Virginia. I could definitely see WVU pulling off another upset.
#4 Baylor: After a slip up last week, they move back up into the top 5 with losses to some teams ahead of them. They still have the best resume in college basketball and their ranking should reflect that.
#5 UCLA: UCLA made an incredible comeback against Oregon to win in dominating second half fashion. They looks as good as any team I’ve seen this year in the second half and I expect them to repeat that play level going forward.
#6 Louisville: You really have to wonder where Louisville would be in the rankings had Mathiang and Adel not been suspended for their game against Virginia. I honestly think the Cards would have come out with the W and they’d still be in my top 3.
#7 North Carolina: As much as it pains me to say it, UNC lost to Duke on thursday night. It was a very close game but ultimately Duke pulled off the win. Granted, UNC was missing Hicks, which makes the game completely different, but props to dude nonetheless.
#8 Oregon: The Ducks blew a 19 point lead against UCLA, taking on the form of a Falcons or Warriors team but to be fair, they really weren’t supposed to win that game anyway. You could still make the argument that Oregon is the best team in the Pac 12 so this loss isn’t that big deal for them.
#9 Arizona: Zona has had a roller coaster couple of weeks but this week was pretty melo. Not too much happened for this squad and they are on their way back up to being one of the best teams in the Pac 12.
#10 Kentucky: UK is starting to get back on track after they lost to Florida in an embarrassing rout. Kentucky is trying yo get back into top 5 form and I think they’ll be there soon enough.
#11 Cincinnati: Their win streak finally came to an end this week when they lost to SMU. Although SMU is a ranked opponent and a good loss in the eyes of the committee, SMU still may be benefitting from being in an easier conference. Cincy is still a 3 seed in my book though, and I expect them to start their win streak all over again.
#12 Duke: You already know what I’m going to say about this team. They beat UNC, enough said. They are sadly starting to play like the Duke we all thought they would be. Don’t really wanna drone on about this team for obvious reasons but I will say that UNC is gonna beat them on March 4th.
#13 Wisconsin got semi upset but Northwestern on sunday. Although Northwestern is a good team, they’re still unranked and a loss is a loss so Wisconsin had to go down a few steps.
#14 Florida: Pretty under the radar week but they are continuing to dominate. I still want to see more from them before I consider them a top 10 team but they are right on the edge of gaining that title.
#15 Purdue: Poor Purdue cannot make past the mid teens in the rankings. Surely this win streak will be the streak that propels them into the top 10. They beat their rival Indiana in a tight game on thursday but other than that, their week was fairly uneventful. Looking forward to seeing Purdue continue to get it done increase they can somehow pull out a 3 seed.
#16 Virginia: Yet another up and down week for Virginia. They beat Louisville at the beginning of the week and then they lost to Virginia Tech to end the week. Louisville isn’t actually that great of a win because of their suspensions, so overall I had them moving down this week.
#17 SMU: They have continued to play extremely well and they pulled off their first good win in a while when they beat Cincinnati. SMU is starting to look like a legitimate threat and if they could continue their win streak to the tourney they could be looking at a 3 or 4 seed.
#18 Florida State: Florida State is slowly coming back to the top 10. They really haven’t gotten any good wins recently but they will definitely be piling some on as the season comes to a close. Still, losing to ND hurt them a little bit, even if it is a good loss.
#19 WVU: They played well this week and started to make up for the loss against OKST. They have Kansas on monday which will be huge for their resume.
#20 South Carolina: They played really bad against Bama and ultimately lost in quadruple overtime. They finished the week 1-1 when they beat Mississippi State but that isn’t a good win so they really they had nowhere to go but down.
#21 Saint Mary’s: Not a bad week at all for this squad, even though they lost. They lost to the #1 team in the nation so you can't really fault them too much. Still though, that was a very crucial game for them because they won’t be able to win the conference most likely after that.
#22 Notre Dame: They pulled off the win against FSU on saturday, which was enough to make an appearance back in the top 25. They just gotta keep getting wins like this if they want any chance of getting a 4 or 5 seed.
#23 Creighton: Not much to say about this team's week. They had one game on saturday against DePaul and won. Let’s just move on.
#24 Butler: Sure they got upset by providence but this is still one of the best teams in the big east and could make it far in the tourney. I couldn’t justify bouncing them from the rankings.
#25 OKST: OKST has been playing extremely well recently and they are showing no signs of stopping. Their only recent loss came to Baylor and it was a down to the wire finish. I think this team is a dark house to upset some teams in the tourney, especially if they are an 8 or 9 seed.