College basketball conference rankings: Big week for Big 12

The Big 12 has the new No. 1 team in the AP Top 25 but is the conference holding down the top spot in our conference power rankings?

1. Big East

The Seton Hall Pirates have gone undefeated in their first six Big East games and currently sit comfortably as the best team in the conference standings. The return of Myles Powell–who just racked up his 2,000th career point against St. John’s at Madison Square Garden–has turned this team into a true threat. Who’s to say that Powell doesn’t catch fire for a couple of weeks in March and lead this team to places they haven’t been since the early 1990s? Even though previous top-dog Butler was taken down twice this week, one of their losses also represented the first Big East win for the DePaul Blue Demons.

2. Big 12

Having the No. 1 team in the country is no small feat and for that, it was hard to find a valid reason for keeping the Big 12 out of the top spot this week. Yet, in the end, keeping the conference at number two felt right. Though the ranked teams held serve for the most part–looking at you West Virginia–on the whole, the Big East felt a little more deserving of taking home the top ranking, unlike how the Bears usurped Gonzaga in the eyes of AP voters. A target is now placed square on the back of the Bears going forward and in one of the few conferences with a true round-robin format they are going to start seeing teams for a second time and they will surely get the best shot each night as a win against them could be a season-defining moment.

3. SEC

The Kentucky Wildcats did slip up against the South Carolina Gamecocks but any buzzer-beater upset is so much fun that it’s hard to knock them and the conference too much. Plus, they responded in a big way with a road win over Arkansas who was 14-2 entering the much-awaited matchup. John Calipari managed to get thrown out in Fayetteville but his team used the ejection as a catalyst to surge to victory. We also were treated to arguably the best performance by Anthony Edwards since Maui. He scored 20 first-half points to pace the Georgia Bulldogs in an easy win over the Tennessee Volunteers.

4. Pac-12

What a performance Payton Pritchard had in the Oregon Ducks three-point overtime road win against the Washington Huskies. Things didn’t look good for Dana Altman’s team for most of the game but in the second half, and to close the game, it was all Pritchard and he did not disappoint. A couple of 30-foot 3-pointers, including the game-winner, helped Oregon escape with a win. The other team that has drawn national interest, the Arizona Wildcats, had a statement win of their own as they handled the Colorado Buffaloes at home. Zeke Nnaji, Nico Mannion and Josh Green combined to score 37 of the teams 75 points and they ended up winning by 21.

5. Big Ten

The Rutgers Scarlet Knights made their debut in the 2019 AP Top 25 Poll this week checking in at No. 24. This is a big deal for New Jersey’s state university as it marks its first appearance in the AP Poll since March of 1979. Steve Pikiell has quickly reinvigorated this program and the Big Ten is finally getting the payoff it envisioned when it made the choice to expand and bring in Maryland and Rutgers in 2013. Speaking of the Terrapins, they split their two games this week, losing on the road to Wisconsin and beating Purdue in College Park. As the deepest conference in the country, splits are going to become a common theme among the upper tier of teams for the rest of conference play.

6. American

In the AAC the Memphis Tigers, Houston Cougars and Wichita State Shockers are doing what they can to elevate this conference but none of the three has been able to run away with the conference. This time it was elite-on-elite violence as the Cougars took down the Shockers who were coming off a recent win over the Tigers. As the season wanes on, these three teams will be worth keeping an eye on because they could prove to be a difficult out for an unsuspecting team come March.

7. ACC

When the headline from a week’s worth of action in the ACC is that the Clemson Tigers were able to beat North Carolina and Duke in back-to-back games it’s a little easier to see why the conference that used to be the head of the class finds itself with the lowest grade. Not to take anything away from Clemson — and let’s be honest the school was sorely needing some cheering up after the performance by the football team in the national championship game — but they aren’t the team that should be taking down the two giants of Tobacco Road. Consequently, they couldn’t go a perfect 3-0 in the triangle as they lost to North Carolina State to close out their trip up North.

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