🚨 NEW AP TOP 25 🚨

1. Auburn
2. Iowa State
3. Duke
4. Alabama
5. Florida
6. Tennessee
7. Marquette
8. Kentucky
9. Kansas
10. Houston
11. Texas A&M
12. Michigan St
13. Oregon
14. UConn
15. Miss State
16. Gonzaga
17. Purdue
18. Memphis
19. Illinois
20. Michigan
21. Ole Miss
22.…

— The Field of 68 (@TheFieldOf68) January 13, 2025

Highest ever for ISU

Auburn is your new No. 1 and Iowa State earns its highest ranking in men's AP Poll history 🏀

1.Auburn
2.Iowa State
3.Duke
4.Alabama
5.Florida
6.Tennessee
7.Marquette
8.Kentucky
9.Kansas
10. Houston

— SportsCenter (@SportsCenter) January 13, 2025

The tents are out at Hilton already for KU game. Jayhawks walking into a hornets nest Wednesday.

SEC: 9
B1G: 6
B12: 4
Big East: 2
West Coast: 1
Mtn West: 1
American: 1
ACC: 1

whitetrash said:

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SEC: 9
B1G: 6
B12: 4
Big East: 2
West Coast: 1
Mtn West: 1
American: 1
ACC: 1

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Bit of a fall for B12 after last couple of years

boognish_bear said:

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whitetrash said:

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SEC: 9
B1G: 6
B12: 4
Big East: 2
West Coast: 1
Mtn West: 1
American: 1
ACC: 1

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Bit of a fall for B12 after last couple of years

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These things are always cyclical. There have been several years the Big East has been one of the country's top conferences, and that will likely only be a three-bid league this year.

The important thing is commitment. If your league's programs are committed to competing at the highest level, the results will take care of themselves over time.

On the overarching topic of this thread, I think we're likely about the 25th best team on the country this year. We keep hovering right around that line, and that's probably what we are.

That doesn't mean that we can't get better than that, but this is probably just more of a fringe top-25 than a top-15 team like most of ours have been the past decade or so.

bear2be2 said:

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On the overarching topic of this thread, I think we're likely about the 25th best team on the country this year. We keep hovering right around that line, and that's probably what we are.

That doesn't mean that we can't get better than that, but this is probably just more of a fringe top-25 than a top-15 team like most of ours have been the past decade or so.

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KenPom has us 18th right now. I think we're probably in the 15-22 range, but with potential to maybe crack the Top 10 if things break our way and we keep improving.

Since the SEC wasn't as dominate in football this year, the polls make them their new favorite conference for basketball.

ImABearToo said:

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Since the SEC wasn't as dominate in football this year, the polls make them their new favorite conference for basketball.

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They are the best conference right now

Mitch Henessey said:

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bear2be2 said:

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On the overarching topic of this thread, I think we're likely about the 25th best team on the country this year. We keep hovering right around that line, and that's probably what we are.

That doesn't mean that we can't get better than that, but this is probably just more of a fringe top-25 than a top-15 team like most of ours have been the past decade or so.

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KenPom has us 18th right now. I think we're probably in the 15-22 range, but with potential to maybe crack the Top 10 if things break our way and we keep improving.

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There area a couple of key factors that put a hard cap on this team's ceiling IMO -- the lack of frontcourt depth and our inability, as a guard-oriented team, to consistently knock down 3s.

The latter can be improved upon with work and/or better luck. But there's nothing we can do at this point to address the former.

The good news is that I would have put defensive intensity on that list before the start of Big 12 play, and we seem to be improving there, so progress can still be achieved. But we've still got a long way to go to crack the top 15 and especially the top 10 IMO.

Yeah..I think there will be games we look like a Top 10 team (i.e. were making 3's)... but this 20 game conference grind is gonna expose our depth.

I'm not buying elite

Among the elite 📈 pic.twitter.com/EPZ5OmvC5V

— Big 12 Conference (@Big12Conference) January 15, 2025

And we drop out of the Top25 again....

MANNNN…..if you're not a @CycloneMBB fan right now, what are you doing?#Big12MBB | @CycloneMBB pic.twitter.com/X5upkIwjy2

— Big 12 Conference (@Big12Conference) January 16, 2025

Strong basketball team. Still like Dukes combination of talent, effort, and size. Think Duke, Auburn, Isu are probably the best teams but Dukes upside by EOY is huge.

Not sure Duke can match the physicality of Auburn or ISU despite their talent

IowaBear said:

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Not sure Duke can match the physicality of Auburn or ISU despite their talent

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They looked fine against Auburn earlier in the year. Now granted that was at home, but several of their top players were essentially high schoolers at that point.

By year end that team could be special as they have so much more room for improvement than pretty much any team in the country. I don't think Iowa st or Auburn have that kind of upside.

Will see if March. Past results have proven over and over the veteran teams prevail in March. Duke typically folds like a pretzel the moment they face adversity in the big dance. They're loaded. But that's nothing new, Duke is loaded yearly and typically falls flat in March.

IowaBear said:

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Not sure Duke can match the physicality of Auburn or ISU despite their talent

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Iowa State is really damn good this year.

Tech is going be kicking themselves for not closing that game out on Saturday. That would have been a resume-building win for them.