Undefeated Pitt women enter poll for first time
A fast start has Pittsburgh enjoying something it hasn’t experienced for a while – a national ranking in women’s basketball. Pittsburgh joined The Associated Press poll at No. 24 on Monday, its first appearance in 27 years. Arkansas also moved into the rankings, while Rutgers and Nebraska dropped out, ending a run of 42 consecutive appearances in the Top 25 for Rutgers.
At 10-0, Pittsburgh is off to its best start ever and the Panthers have done it after losing senior point guard Mallorie Winn to a torn knee ligament two weeks before the season opener. Winn was the team’s No. 2 scorer last season and a second-team all-Big East selection.
“That was pretty devastating,” coach Agnus Berenato said. “But we never missed a beat and we never acted like we missed a beat as a staff. We told our players we still have goals. We still want to be in the NCAA tournament, we still want to be in the Top 25.
“That’s why you’re on a team. I told our players exactly how we were going to make up those points.”
Maryland, North Carolina, Oklahoma and Duke remained the top four teams. The only change was Oklahoma losing a first-place vote to Duke, which routed three ranked teams during the past week.
The Blue Devils (9-0) defeated then-No. 19 Rutgers 85-45, then-No. 11 Vanderbilt 69-48 and then-No. 22 Texas 80-52. That was enough to prompt Clay Horning of the Norman, Okla., Transcript to switch his first-place vote from Oklahoma to Duke.
Maryland (12-0) remained the overwhelming choice for No. 1, receiving 46 of 50 first-place votes from a national media panel and compiling 1,243 points. North Carolina (10-0) had one first-place vote and 1,188 points, while Oklahoma had two first-place votes and 1,149 points. Duke trailed the Sooners by 41 points.
LSU’s victory over Ohio State and losses to unranked teams by Georgia and Purdue caused some shuffling through the rest of the top 10.
No. 5 Tennessee and No. 6 Connecticut each moved up one spot, while LSU jumped two places to seventh after beating the Buckeyes 75-51 behind a big game from center Sylvia Fowles, who outplayed her Ohio State counterpart, Jessica Davenport.
Ohio State dropped three places to eighth, Baylor jumped three spots to ninth and Arizona State moved from 13th to 10th, the Sun Devils’ highest ranking this season.
Georgia dropped from eighth to 11th after losing to Middle Tennessee, while Purdue went from 10th to 13th after a loss to Notre Dame. The loss to Duke dropped Vanderbilt one spot to 12th.
Stanford remained 14th, while No. 15 California, No. 16 Louisville and No. 17 DePaul each advanced one spot. Michigan State, Texas A&M and George Washington completed the top 20.
Marquette, New Mexico, Texas, Pittsburgh and Arkansas held the final five places.
Arkansas (9-1), which has lost only to North Carolina, made the Top 25 for the first time under coach Susie Gardner.
Rutgers (3-4) had appeared in every poll since the 2004-05 preseason rankings. The Scarlet Knights lost to DePaul three days after losing to Duke but finished the week with a victory over Princeton.
Berenato took the Pittsburgh job in 2003 after 15 seasons at Georgia Tech. The Panthers won a total of 19 games in her first two years, then went 22-11 last season and reached the semifinals of the WNIT.
“We don’t have any all-stars,” said Berenato, who starts a freshman, three sophomores and a junior. “We had to recruit kids with the promise that if you come, you can be an impact player, we’ll take you to the next level and we’ll be big time.
“And we will be big time. They believed it and they all stepped up.”