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Saturday in the SEC should be a great start to conference play. (Luke Hales/Getty Images)
The college basketball world, at least in the SEC, is about to get a lot more entertaining.
Here’s everything you missed in Week 8 of the college basketball season, and the latest Associated Press men’s basketball poll.
SEC play opens this week
It was a very quiet week last week over the holidays, and not much changed at the top of the rankings. Tennessee retained the No. 1 ranking on Monday, followed again by Auburn, Iowa State, Duke and Alabama. In fact, the first 13 teams stayed the same from last week. The biggest improvement came from UCLA, which jumped up seven spots to No. 15 after it beat Gonzaga 65-62 on Saturday. That pushed the Bruins to 11-2 on the season, and made up for last week’s two-point loss to North Carolina.
SEC play gets going this week, however, and we should learn a few things very quickly.
Let’s start with the Vols, who will host No. 23 Arkansas on Saturday. It marks the first legitimate matchup for Tennessee since it snuck past Illinois on a game-winner from Jordan Gainey earlier this month. The game with the Razorbacks will serve as a good precursor for next Tuesday’s game at undefeated Florida.
Speaking of the Gators, they’ll enter SEC play with a perfect 13-0 record. It’s the best start for the program since the 2005-06 season. While five of Florida’s wins have come against Power 5 opponents, they’ve yet to play another ranked team. That’ll change when they travel to Rupp Arena and play No. 10 Kentucky on Saturday morning — which will mark the first of three straight ranked games.
We’ll see if this Gators team is as good as their record shows in the coming days.
“We definitely feel like we’re prepared [for SEC play],” guard Walter Clayton Jr. said after their 40-point win over Stetson…
Source link : https://sports.yahoo.com/mens-basketball-ap-poll-watch-top-ranked-tennessee-florida-oklahoma-as-sec-play-opens-this-week-181930830.html
Author : Yahoo Sports
Publish date : 2024-12-30 18:19:00
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