Basketball | University of Michigan

Rod Beard's AP Top 25 basketball ballot

There was a lot of movement in the top 25 this week, which made it one of the toughest weeks this season to assemble my ballot. How do you gauge No. 1 Kentucky’s win over No. 5 North Carolina? It’s a one-point game at Lexington that came down to the last possession. It’s certainly not a bad loss for the Tar Heels — who fell from No. 1 last week after losing to UNLV — but should they fall from the Top 5? Ohio State demolished No. 3 Duke, but is that enough to vote the Buckeyes No. 1 ahead of Kentucky? What do you make of Wisconsin’s two losses the great starts by Harvard, Illinois and Georgetown? Are they worthy of cracking the Top 25?
Here’s my ballot:

  1. Kentucky
  2. Ohio State
  3. Syracuse
  4. Louisville
  5. Baylor
  6. North Carolina
  7. Duke
  8. Connecticut
  9. Xavier
  10. Marquette
  11. Missouri
  12. Florida
  13. Kansas
  14. Pittsburgh
  15. Alabama
  16. Wisconsin
  17. Mississippi State
  18. Harvard
  19. Michigan
  20. Memphis
  21. Georgetown
  22. Texas A&M
  23. Illinois
  24. Michigan State
  25. Creighton

I settled on putting North Carolina at No. 6 and leapfrogging Duke, who was ranked in front last week. Louisville and Baylor cracked the top 5, though Baylor may have deserved the nod between these two. Marquette had a good week and moved up to No. 10 for me, and Harvard, which I ranked last week, moved up to No. 18. I also added Georgetown, Illinois and Creighton to the ballot after some other teams in the bottom five had questionable losses.

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