After an up-and-down week, Duke men’s basketball checks in at No. 9 in the latest AP poll. The Blue Zone is here to break down movement in the poll around the country:
A Small Setback
To start its first rivalry week off, Duke survived a classic “trap game” at Virginia Tech. Against the Hokies, head coach Jon Scheyer’s squad was excellent — with four players in double figures and freshman guard Jared McCain just a point away from a double-double. In their marquee matchup, however, the Blue Devils failed to impress. North Carolina outplayed Duke from the start, and led nearly the entire 40 minutes. The Blue Devils were competitive with the Tar Heels, but never looked like the better side, and this week’s ranking at No. 9 acknowledges just that. North Carolina remains near the top, checking in at No. 3.
Four Top-10 Matchups
Outside of the state of North Carolina, the college basketball world had its fair share of excitement this weekend, with four top-ten matchups across the country. To start the weekend, then-No. 8 Kansas knocked off then-No. 4 Houston, and immediately following the Tobacco-Road rivalry, then-No. 5 Tennessee took down then-No. 10 Kentucky in Lexington, Ky. As a result of the matchups, the Jayhawks and the Volunteers rose to fourth and sixth in the polls, respectively, while the Cougars and the Wildcats dropped to fifth and 17th, respectively. Moving on to Sunday, then-No. 2 Purdue outlasted then-No. 6 Wisconsin, who lost its second straight this week. While the Badgers dropped to 11th, the Boilermakers continued to stack their already loaded in-season resume, and look heads-and-shoulders above any other squad in the Big 10.
Chaos in the Big 12
Perhaps the deepest conference in basketball, the Big 12 delivered entertaining basketball all weekend — most notably having multiple ranked programs fall to lower or unranked teams. Outside of Kansas-Houston, the most notable upset was arguably unranked Cincinnati going to Lubbock, Tex., and knocking off then-No. 15 Texas Tech, dropping the Red Raiders to 23rd in the poll. The Big 12 still has six teams in the poll, though, tops of any conference.
Full Rankings:
1. UConn
2. Purdue
3. North Carolina
4. Kansas
5. Houston
6. Tennessee
7. Marquette
8. Arizona
9. Duke
10. Illinois
11. Wisconsin
12. Auburn
13. Baylor
14. Iowa State
15. South Carolina
16. Alabama
17. Kentucky
18. Dayton
19. Creighton
20. Florida Atlantic
21. BYU
22. Utah State
23. Texas Tech
24. San Diego State
25. New Mexico
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