This week’s polls both agree, and again agree unanimously, that Connecticut and Oklahoma are the top two teams in the nation. They also agree that Auburn, Stanford, Baylor and Cal are the next four teams. Finally, they both agree on what teams make up the next 18 spots and generally agree with their placement. Tennessee, which is six spots higher in the AP poll than in the coaches’, is the team on whom the polls most disagree.
While there is basic agreement on the rankings, as always there are rankings that don’t seem to jive with the teams’ head-to-head performances. Perhaps the biggest anomaly is the ranking of the ACC teams. The top four teams in the conference--Duke, North Carolina, Maryland and Florida State--are all ranked in the top 12 nationally. Both polls also both have Florida State ranked as the lowest of these four teams.
But the Seminoles, 21-5 overall and 9-1 in conference play after their victory over North Carolina, are now alone in first place in the ACC; they have no remaining games against any of the other three and are definitely in a position to claim their first regular season championship. In addition to their seven-point victory over North Carolina (22-4, 7-3 ACC) on the thirteenth of this month, Sue Semrau’s team defeated Duke (21-3, 9-2 ACC) by seven in overtime in their head-to-head match on January 29. Florida State’s only loss in the conference was a one-point squeaker to Maryland (21-4, 8-2 ACC), who pulled out the win on a buzzer beater by Kristi Toliver.
The Seminoles’ ranking behind the other three ACC teams, including two they defeated, spotlights one of the inherent flaws in the polls: Teams that begin the season ranked will always have an advantage over teams that surprise and must crawl their way up the rankings from the bottom.
The rankings also make clear that the ACC and Big 12 conference tournaments will be at least as competitive, although not as long, as the NCAA tournament looks to be. The ACC has the four teams ranked in the top 12, plus Virginia, which is ranked at 21/23. The Big 12 does them one better. They have five teams--Oklahoma, Baylor, Texas, Texas A&M, and Kansas State--all ranked in the top 16 of both polls, as well as Iowa State, which is ranked 21st by the AP and 23rd by the coaches.
In last week’s marquee game, Number Six Stanford defeated Number 3 Cal to jump ahead of them in the rankings and tie them for the PAC-10 lead. This week’s key game comes on Saturday when Baylor, currently Number Five, travels to Number Two Oklahoma. The Sooners are playing the second-best basketball in the nation and a victory over the Bears would go a long way to assuring that they not only receive a number-one seed in the NCAA tournament, but also the second overall seed and with it the opportunity to stay in the bracket opposite UConn until the Final Four.
In other key games: On Saturday, Texas A&M, ranked 14th by the AP and 11th by the coaches, hosts Texas, 12/13, in a game between rivals that will be vital in the Big 12 standings. On Sunday, Duke and Maryland, ranked seventh and ninth by the AP but eighth and seventh, respectively, by the coaches, tangle at Maryland in front of what looks to be a sold-out arena.
Despite those three very attractive match-ups, there are not a lot of games between ranked teams in the upcoming week. The couple on tap have the makings of total mismatches: Number Three Auburn goes to Vanderbilt (18/20) on Thursday, while top-ranked UConn takes its show to Notre Dame, Number 24 in both polls, on Sunday.