Dec. 3—THE ASSOCIATED PRESS TOP 25
The top 25 teams in The Associated Press’ women’s college basketball poll, with first-place votes in parentheses, and total points based on 25 points for a first-place vote through one point for a 25th-place vote and previous ranking.
RK., TEAM REC. PTS PRV
1. UCLA (25) 8-0 792 1
2. Connecticut (7) 6-0 771 2
3. South Carolina 7-1 727 4
4. Texas 7-0 704 5
5. LSU 9-0 629 7
6. Southern Cal 6-1 619 6
7. Maryland 8-0 572 10
8. Duke 8-1 564 13
9. TCU 8-0 513 17
10. Notre Dame 5-2 501 3
11. Oklahoma 6-1 499 8
12. Ohio State 7-0 443 11
13. Kansas State 7-1 425 9
14. Kentucky 7-0 405 14
15. West Virginia 8-1 390 12
16. North Carolina 7-1 351 16
17. Iowa 8-0 214 22
18. Mississippi 5-2 211 18
19. Alabama 9-0 183 23
20. Iowa State 6-2 176 15
21. Illinois 7-1 129 19
22. Louisville 5-2 111 24
23. Michigan 7-1 96 NR
24. Michigan State 8-0 86 NR
25. Nebraska 6-1 68 25
Others receiving votes: North Carolina State 58, Georgia Tech 33, Stanford 28, Tennessee 16, Oregon 15, Florida State 14, Richmond 13, Mississippi State 11, Vanderbilt 8, Baylor 6, Utah 5, Harvard 4, South Dakota State 4, Creighton 3, Minnesota 3.
THE NEWS-GAZETTE’S TOP 25
Illinois beat writer Joe Vozzelli is in his sixth season as an AP Top 25 voter. Here’s how his fourth regular-season ballot of the 2024-25 season shook out:
Rk., Team Prev
1. UCLA 1
2. Connecticut 3
3. South Carolina 4
4. Texas 5
5. LSU 7
6. Maryland 8
7. Notre Dame 2
8. Southern Cal 6
9. Duke 12
10. Oklahoma 9
11. Ohio State 11
12. Kentucky 18
13. Kansas State 10
14. TCU 21
15. West Virginia 15
16. North Carolina 14
17. Alabama 20
18. Iowa 24
19. Louisville 23
20. Mississippi 16
21. Iowa State 13
22. Illinois 17
23. Baylor 25
24. Michigan NR
25. Nebraska NR
Who’s up
Duke. Few teams had a more impressive Thanksgiving week than Kara Lawson’s Blue Devils. A pair of Top 10 wins against Kansas State and Oklahoma at the Ball Dawgs Classic in Las Vegas. That was enough to move Duke up five spots and into the Top 10 at No. 8, the program’s highest AP ranking in just over 10 years. Reigan Richardson and Co. are trying to build off last March’s Sweet 16 appearance. The emergence of Ashlon Jackson could be key to that after the junior guard averaged 24.0 points in her team’s two wins in Las Vegas, including a 30-point outburst that featured six made three-pointers in the 73-62 win against Kansas State.
Who’s down
Notre Dame. It had been more than 31/2 years since the Irish had a losing streak. That’s exactly what happened this past week. A 74-61 victory at Southern Cal led to Notre Dame climbing to No. 3 in the AP poll. All of that good work was undone, however, after consecutive losses to TCU and Utah in the Cayman Islands sent the Irish reeling with a seven-place drop in Monday’s Top 25. Hannah Hidalgo still remains one of the top guards in the country, and the Notre Dame sophomore could also emerge as a dark-horse contender for National Player of the Year honors.
Who to watch
This feels like a rather significant six days for TCU. The Horned Frogs were among the big gainers on Monday, going from No. 17 to No. 9. But TCU’s schedule is also such that after playing No. 3 South Carolina (6 p.m., Sunday, ESPN2) at Dickies Arena in Fort Worth, Texas, the Horned Frogs don’t have another current ranked team on their schedule until early February with back-to-back Big 12 road games against Iowa State and Kansas State. Dawn Staley continues to challenge her defending champion Gamecocks, who will have a pair of ranked matchups starting on Thursday at home against Duke before a second straight Top 10 showdown with TCU. South Carolina posted two 40-plus point wins last week against Iowa State and Purdue.
