Following another quiet week of college basketball action, CBS Sports’ Gary Parrish updated his Top 25 and 1 rankings.
With the upcoming weekend slate expected to give Parrish more to work with in the coming day, here’s how his final rankings before the holiday week shaped up.
Tennessee will likely enter SEC play next month with an undefeated record. In a conference that features 10 teams on Parrish’s list, that’s an impressive feat despite their strength of schedule.
North Florida transfer Chaz Lanier has been the star of the show in Knoxville during the non-conference portion of the season, averaging 18.9 points per game to lead the undefeated Vols.
There isn’t a team in the country with a better resume than Auburn before Christmas. With wins over Houston, Iowa State, North Carolina and Memphis — the only negative came during Auburn’s only true road game of the season so far at Duke.
Auburn has a massive neutral site matchup (in Birmingham, AL — basically a home game for the Tigers) against Purdue on Saturday to help them add to their already impressive resume.
Auburn is the only blemish on the Cyclones’ schedule to this point in the season — an 83-81 loss in the Maui Invitational. Iowa State led by as many as 18 points and led for most of the way before a second-half rally by the Tigers.
They’re 6-0 since then, including a win over a top-five Marquette team to start December, and defeated Iowa 89-80 in the Cy-Hawk Series the following week.
Parrish called Mark Pope’s Kentucky team the story of college basketball during the first couple of months of the season. Had it not been for a hiccup at Clemson, he believes the Wildcats would be in Tennessee’s place as No. 1 in the current AP Poll.
The Wildcats have wins over Duke and Gonzaga already and were able to dispose of in-state rival Louisville to set the stage for one last non-conference test against Ohio State in Madison Square Garden on Saturday.
Duke has arguably the best win in the country after defeating Auburn on its home floor on Dec. 4. However, its loss against Kentucky in November prevents Parrish from ranking the Blue Devils ahead of the Wildcats, not to mention its three-point loss to Kansas as well.
Still, Duke was 5-0 heading into Saturday and improved to 2-0 in ACC play against Georgia Tech on the road.
The Crimson Tide faced one of the toughest non-conference schedules in the country during November, playing three straight Top 25 teams. That was before they went undefeated in their Thanksgiving week tournament against teams like Rutgers and Oregon, who are off to solid starts this season.
Immediately turning around and beating UNC by 15 points, and downing Creighton in Tuscaloosa. The Tide is rolling as SEC play draws closer.
Kansas finished undefeated after a November slate that saw them match up against Michigan State, UNC and Duke. December has not treated them as kindly.
Losing by double-digits to Creighton in the Big 12-Big East Battle, they traveled to Missouri to play the Tigers and got beat in a game where they trailed by as many as 24 points. The Jayhawks cleaned things up against NC State their next time out and will look to get back on the right track against Brown on Saturday before beginning conference play on New Year’s Eve.
Florida’s undefeated run through 11 games this season has seen them defeat five major conference opponents, including North Carolina in Charlotte earlier this week.
With four players averaging in double figures of the Gators so far this season, Walter Clayton Jr. in his second year with the program is leading the charge. Entering the weekend he averages 18.5 points per game along with 3.5 assists and 3.5 boards.
Marquette began the season 8-0 before running into Iowa State to begin December. They followed that up with a 14-point win over an 11th-ranked Wisconsin team, but a loss to Dayton on the road after leading by as many as 13 points was not a good look for the Golden Eagles.
With Big East basketball in full swing beginning with a 10-point win over Butler on Dec. 17, the conference appears to be Marquette’s to lose after UConn lost three games during the non-conference slate.
You can never count out a Tom Izzo-led Michigan State team, and the Spartans have proved why so far this season. Beginning the season unranked and with a 5-2 record, Michigan State has won its last four games and is undefeated so far this month.
For their efforts, they were ranked No. 20 in the latest AP Top 25 poll and are now one of five teams ranked in the Big Ten Conference this week.
11. Ole Miss (10-1)
12. UCLA (10-1)
13. Oregon (10-1)
14. Texas A&M (10-2)
15. Purdue (8-3)
16. Maryland (9-2)
17. Mississippi State (10-1)
18. Illinois (7-3)
19. Memphis (9-2)
20. UConn (9-3)
21. Gonzaga (8-3)
22. San Diego State (7-2)
23. Houston (7-3)
24. Oklahoma (11-0)
25. Georgia (10-1)
26. Baylor (7-3)
