LSU keeps No. 1 spot in AP poll
LSU is unanimous, Louisiana Tech is out. Look no farther than the Bayou State for the major developments in the AP women’s basketball poll.
LSU held the No. 1 spot Monday for the second straight week and this time, the Lady Tigers received all 45 first-place votes from a national media panel.
A slew of upsets triggered a major shuffling in the rest of the Top 25, which for the first time in nearly 23 years did not include Louisiana Tech.
Louisiana Tech (3-2), which had been 21st, lost two of its three games during the week and dropped out, ending a string of 221 consecutive appearances in the poll.
The last time the Lady Techsters were not ranked was the final poll of the 1991-92 season.
Tennessee leads with 344 consecutive poll appearances.
Villanova, 24th last week, also dropped out. Houston joined the poll for the first time this season at No. 22 and Arizona returned at 24th after a one-week absence.
LSU (8-0) beat North Texas 77-51 in its only game last week, but eight others in the Top 25 lost to unranked opponents. That included North Carolina, which lost at Penn State 77-71 and dropped from second to fifth.
Notre Dame and Tennessee also lost, clearing the way for Stanford to jump from fifth to second. Stanford (5-0), idle last week, became the fourth team in five weeks to hold the No. 2.
LSU and Stanford are the only teams in the top 10 that are still unbeaten.
Duke (7-1) jumped seven spots to third after winning at Tennessee and Texas (4-2) climbed three places to fourth. Then it was North Carolina, Baylor and Notre Dame, followed by Connecticut, Tennessee and Ohio State.
Baylor won three times during the week and moved up three spots. Notre Dame dropped four places after losing at home to Michigan State, which went from 15th to 12th. Georgia tumbled from sixth to 11th after losing to Georgia Tech.
Texas Tech was 13th, Vanderbilt 14th and DePaul 15th, followed by Minnesota, Boston College, UCLA, Maryland and Rutgers.
The final five were Purdue, Houston, TCU, Arizona and Kansas State.
Purdue took the most severe drop, falling seven places after losing to Houston and UCLA.
Kansas State, playing without preseason All-American Kendra Wecker, lost to Liberty by 21 and dropped five spots.
UCLA matched Duke for the biggest jump, moving from 25th to 18th. The Bruins beat Pepperdine before knocking off Purdue.
Houston (8-0) has kept winning despite the departure of guard Chandi Jones, the career scoring leader in Conference USA.
The Cougars, who were ninth in the final poll last season, won at Purdue 63-60 on Nov. 30 and had a three-point victory over Virginia. They’ve won the rest of their games by at least 17.
Arizona (6-1) returned to the Top 25 after decisive victories over UTEP and UNC-Greensboro.
Villanova, which had been ranked for two weeks, split its two latest games, losing to George Washington and beating Penn.