Arizona is still No. 1 in The Associated Press college basketball poll and Duke is as close as you can get. <br><br>The Wildcats opened their season Monday with a 95-57 victory over Chaminade in the first
Tuesday, November 21st 2000, 12:00 am
By: News On 6
Arizona is still No. 1 in The Associated Press college basketball poll and Duke is as close as you can get.
The Wildcats opened their season Monday with a 95-57 victory over Chaminade in the first round of the Maui Invitational, just after the latest rankings were released with them still on top.
But Duke (2-0), which beat Princeton and Villanova to advance to the semifinals of the Preseason NIT, was just one point behind, 15 points closer than it was in the first poll of the regular season.
Arizona received 33 first-place votes and 1,654 points from the national media panel, while Duke was No. 1 on 30 ballots. Last week, Arizona had 35 first-place votes, 14 more than Duke.
Kansas, which beat North Dakota 92-61 in its only game last week to improve to 3-0, moved up one place to third, while Michigan State (1-0), which opened its season Sunday with a 97-61 victory over Oakland, Mich., dropped one spot to fourth. The Spartans, the defending national champions, received four first-place votes.
For the second straight week, Stanford, Maryland, North Carolina, Illinois, Tennessee and Seton Hall were ranked fifth through 10th.
Maryland, which opened its season Monday in the Maui Invitational with a 95-73 victory over Louisville, was the only other team to get a first-place vote. The Terrapins play Iliinois in the semifinals at Maui on Tuesday, while Arizona, which is playing without preseason All-America Loren Woods, will face Dayton. Woods was suspended for six games for undisclosed NCAA rules violations.
Florida again led the Second Ten, followed by Connecticut, Utah, Notre Dame, UCLA, Cincinnati, Wake Forest, Wisconsin, Oklahoma and Southern California.
The last five ranked teams were DePaul, Kentucky, St. John's, Arkansas and Virginia.
While the same 25 teams remained in the rankings, the only significant move was Arkansas' drop from 15th to 24th. The Razorbacks (1-1) opened the season with a 90-68 victory over Tennessee State, then lost to Southern Mississippi 63-54 in the championship game of the inaugural John Thompson Classic.
Wisconsin was the third ranked team not to have played since the season began on Nov. 9. The 18th-ranked Badgers open the season Tuesday at No. 9 Tennessee.
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