The Week 16 college basketball rankings will be released Monday afternoon and here are our Top 25 projections.
Another week is in the books and the college basketball rankings are starting to really take shape heading into the NCAA Tournament. We are just a couple of weeks away from conference tournaments and March Madness.
The previous few editions of the college basketball rankings had seen plenty of movement inside the top 10. While only two top-10 teams lost this week, there could be some major movement fro, Nos. 11-25.
Heck, we could even see some new teams enter the AP Top 25 in Week 16. This is the time of year when surprise teams make themselves known and pretenders begin falling in the rankings and even out.
Let’s take a look at what the Week 16 college basketball rankings could look like Monday.
Maryland had no trouble on the road taking down the surprisingly impressive Northwestern Wildcats, but the Terrapins had to face Wisconsin in Madison on Sunday afternoon and that trip wasn’t so kind. They led by six at halftime and were shooting about 50 percent to Wisconsin’s sub-30 percent, but the Badgers woke up in the second half and buried the Terrapins. Still, though, Maryland is only a game out of first place in the Big Ten and I believe it remains in the Top 25.
I predicted Wichita State to make the jump into the Top 25 last week after winning both of their games, but the Shockers continue to build a case for themselves. They’ve won 10 straight games and are in first place in the Mountain Valley Conference. This isn’t quite the same team that went undefeated a couple of years ago, but the Shockers are still talented enough to make a surprise run in the NCAA Tournament.
After starting the season 18-1, the Creighton Bluejays (once a top-10 team) have been wildly inconsistent in recent weeks. In fact, they have gone just 4-4 in their last eight games including a six-point road loss against Seton Hall in Week 15. Although they’re not technically eliminated from the Big East title race, the Bluejays are four games back of Villanova with five games left. Creighton will likely need to win four or all five of its final games to earn a five-seed or higher in the tourney.
Notre Dame was outside of the Top 25, looking in just a couple of weeks ago and now the Fighting Irish are making a climb yet again. They have won four straight games since losing four consecutive which dropped them from a top-15 team out of the rankings completely. The Irish went on the road to beat both Boston College and N.C. State last week and they’re still just 1.5 games out of first place in the ACC standings.
With two wins over St. John’s and DePaul, respectively, in Week 15, the Butler Bulldogs have pulled within three games of first-place Villanova in the Big East standings. The good news? Butler is the second place team in the conference. The bad news? There are just three games remaining for the Bulldogs, meaning they would need to win out and Villanova would need to lose three more in order to tie atop the conference standings. Butler can still improve its seeding by winning out and beating Villanova this week.