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AP Poll Released

UK67KU59 said:
UK ranked 23rd

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NCAA College Basketball Rankings: AP Top 25 Basketball Poll

The official page for the AP Top 25 men's college basketball poll. Keep up to date and view the latest NCAA men's basketball ranking updates each week for the 2023-24 season.
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Why is Gonzaga ranked so high? Don't think they brought in some special recruiting class and don't recall them getting a lot of big name transfers to go with a team that was one of their weaker ones last year (I know they beat our former coach).

Also, not buying the Purdue love with Edey gone.
 
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These polls are meaningless. Just like in football with the playoff poll being the one relevant poll, the ncaa committee February top 16 and then official ncaa tournament reveal are all that matters for basketball.

Just take it 1 game at a time and see what happens. It's an extremely difficult schedule so will be full of challenging and entertaining matchups.
 
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To be honest , I am surprised that we are ranked at all.

Well, let’s try to look at this from a different perspective:
- new coach , while we are very excited about him as Kentucky fun base, he does not have onhis resume a final four or conference title; compare that to the other coaches that are ranked above us in SEC;
- team is all new, while made up quickly 2-3 weeks from portal exclusively and the players have experience it’s still new team that is unproven commodity;
- the players that make up the team are not your typical highly ranked players that everyone was used to see at Kentucky. They might lack certain attributes that NBA scouts are looking for but Coach Pope likes them and we entrusted him with our unconditional full support to rebuild the program.
- lately, Kentucky was not the exact world beaters thanks to Coach Cal and that affects the optics of the pollsters.

Here is the good news: according to the current ranking ,, we are going to play at least 12 ranked teams and have plenty of chances to prove the pollsters wrong.
 
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BlueBomb said:
Regardless of how much everyone is currently in love with Pope, if we finish the season outside the Top 20, this board will implode.
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Nah, not at all. expectations high is NO issue. The Kentucky fan base is back in force. Kentucky fans KNOW basketball. If a good team is put on the floor and loses, Kentucky fans know why. Coach Pope has been open to UK and the fans. Kentucky fans are NOT stupid, they are near experts in the game (Minus me though.) I just love UK and what it means to so many including me...
 
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I think 23 is fair.

I think we're a top 15 team. Maybe we get to top 10 with coaching and if the guys gel together well.
I think there's a lot of unknown with us, and that causes us to slide. I think we'll finish higher at the end of the regular season.

If we don't, I think most will show Pope some grace. It's his 1st season. He had to build the roster from scratch.
 
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I think 23 is our floor, overall. The SEC has eight teams in the top 25 and we play a few OOC big boys.

Some might be concerned with the hit or miss nature of relying on threes, but I trust that we can go to the post with this team if the shots just aren't falling. That's a luxury BYU didn't have last year.

The team that Pope has assembled is far and away more athletic than last year's Cougs. The teams we'll have in future seasons will be even more athletic.

Pope's system works. How well it works with burger boys and experienced players is something nobody knows.

Yet.

That said, I'm happy with where we are and look forward to a challenging season.
 
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It's impossible for me to rank the Cats on a scale against other teams because at this point in time I have zero knowledge as to the roster of 99% of other teams. I just don't keep up w/ other teams' off-season movement/recruitment.

What I do know is that I like the way Pope constructed our roster-2 deep at every spot w/ grown men who can all shoot the ball. And all assembled from scratch in 6 or 8 weeks? I believe we'll be crazy good w/in that context.
 
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Eagles_Ball said:
I tend to agree, I think it'll be higher. But the 8th best team in the SEC is likely to be a top 25 team.
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I can't see the SEC having 8 teams in the top 25 for very long. The league will be very strong but I can't see 8 top 25 teams. At least a 1/3 of that list will drop out by mid season, possibly even half. Other teams from other leagues will have good seasons and deserve to be there. Some will be extremely over-valued.
 
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I like having a chip on our shoulder to start the season. I think Pope and the team will thrive having to climb the hill to the top.
 
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BlueBomb said:
Regardless of how much everyone is currently in love with Pope, if we finish the season outside the Top 20, this board will implode.
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No.
BillyG first year, we were bubble team and never in Top 25 after loss to Gardner Webb. Still, there was no gnashing of teeth or calls for firing. There looked like improvement during the season. Recruiting stories of 8th graders kept everyone distracted. Even second year as long as he was insulting female reporters the knuckle draggers had his back.

Pope and his playing back the his this preseason gives him way more cushion than you think.
 
mcwildcats04 said:
Why is Gonzaga ranked so high? Don't think they brought in some special recruiting class and don't recall them getting a lot of big name transfers to go with a team that was one of their weaker ones last year (I know they beat our former coach).
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They have a very experienced team that has already played a full season together. While every other team is trying to figure their team out, Gonzaga already has a massive headstart.

Nembhard and Hickman are arguably one of the best starting college backcourts this season. Most of their starters are First-Team All-Conference, and they added a coveted transfer in Khalif Battle. Michael Ajayi withdrew from the NBA Draft to return to school. Graham Ike is an early favorite for the Wooden Award.
 
PopesReignOverCardinals said:
They have a very experienced team that has already played a full season together. While every other team is trying to figure their team out, Gonzaga already has a massive headstart.

Nembhard and Hickman are arguably one of the best starting college backcourts this season. Most of their starters are First-Team All-Conference, and they added a coveted transfer in Khalif Battle. Michael Ajayi withdrew from the NBA Draft to return to school. Graham Ike is an early favorite for the Wooden Award.
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Okay, getting Ike back is big especially for them as I remember how good he was for them last year. I thought he was gone now.
 
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