Stanford Moves to No. 1 in AP Poll

Stanford moved into the No. 1 spot in The Associated Press' college basketball poll Monday, the second straight season the Cardinal have held the top spot. <br><br>They went from second to first, replacing

Monday, January 8th 2001, 12:00 am

By: News On 6

Stanford moved into the No. 1 spot in The Associated Press' college basketball poll Monday, the second straight season the Cardinal have held the top spot.

They went from second to first, replacing Michigan State, which lost 59-58 at Indiana on a buzzer-beating 3-pointer. Kirk Haston's game-winner on Sunday ended the nation's longest winning streak at 23 games and whittled the number of unbeaten Division I teams to four.

The Cardinal (13-0), whose No. 1 ranking last season was the first in school history, received all 70 first-place votes and 1,750 points from the national media panel. Stanford, which beat Arizona State and Arizona on the road this week, is the first unanimous No. 1 since North Carolina on Dec. 22, 1997, and is the fourth team to be on top of the rankings this season.

Duke (13-1), whose only loss this season was by one point at Stanford, moved from third to second and had 1,667 points. Michigan State (12-1), which held the top spot for two weeks after replacing Duke, was third and was followed by Tennessee and Kansas, which both moved up two places from last week.

Wake Forest, which was knocked from the ranks of the unbeatens on Saturday by North Carolina, dropped from fourth to No. 6 and was followed in the Top Ten by Illinois, Florida, North Carolina and Virginia.

Syracuse moved up three spots to lead the Second Ten and was followed by Georgetown, Connecticut, Maryland, Seton Hall, Alabama, Wisconsin, Iowa State, Southern California and Mississippi.

The last five ranked teams were Arizona, Oklahoma, Texas, Boston College and Notre Dame.

Boston College (11-0) was the week's only newcomer to the Top 25. The Eagles, who are off to the best start in school history, are one of the other unbeatens along with Georgetown (13-0) and unranked Baylor (12-0).

The Eagles, who were last ranked on Jan. 20, 1997, replaced Cincinnati, which dropped from No. 25. The Bearcats (10-3) won their only game last week, 76-66 over Charlotte, but that wasn't enough to keep them from falling out of the rankings for the first time since Jan. 18, 1998.

The other team to be ranked No. 1 this season was Arizona, which held the top spot in the preseason poll and for the first two weeks of the regular season. The four No. 1 teams matches the total from all last season when Connecticut held it in the preseason poll, Cincinnati had it for a total of 12 weeks, Stanford for five and Duke for the final poll.

Stanford and Arizona give the Pac-10 two No. 1 teams this season, the first time that has happened since Duke and North Carolina of the Atlantic Coast Conference did it in 1997-98.

With Boston College moving in, the Big East now has six ranked teams â€” Syracuse, Georgetown, Connecticut, Seton Hall and Notre Dame â€” one more than the ACC â€” Duke, Wake Forest, North Carolina, Virginia and Maryland.

The Southeastern Conference and Big 12 each have four teams in the Top 25 and the Pac-10 and Big Ten have three each, meaning the whole poll comes from six leagues.

Georgetown, which beat West Virginia and Seton Hall last week, made the biggest jump in moving from 19th to No. 12, while Oklahoma, which lost 100-80 to Iowa State, had the biggest drop, falling from 15th to No. 22.