{"id":593045,"date":"2026-02-09T18:49:12","date_gmt":"2026-02-09T18:49:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/593045\/"},"modified":"2026-02-09T18:49:12","modified_gmt":"2026-02-09T18:49:12","slug":"texas-tech-slides-houston-joins-top-3","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/593045\/","title":{"rendered":"Texas Tech slides; Houston joins top 3"},"content":{"rendered":"

Arizona remained firmly atop The Associated Press Top 25 men\u2019s college basketball poll<\/a> for a ninth consecutive week Monday, while Houston jumped back into the top 5 and Kentucky returned to the rankings for the first time since December.<\/p>\n

Tommy Lloyd\u2019s Wildcats (23-0) claimed all 59 first-place votes in the latest poll, making them the unanimous choice for a fourth consecutive week. That comes after Arizona \u2014 one of two unbeaten teams left in Division I \u2014 won at rival Arizona State<\/a>, then returned home to beat Oklahoma State by 37 points<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Michigan (22-1) remained at No. 2, marking the sixth time in Arizona\u2019s current reign that the Wolverines sat right behind the Wildcats.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s been little question as to those two teams being regarded as the nation\u2019s best, though the major analytics data sites have preferred a reverse order. KenPom, Evan Miyakawa and Bart Torvik all rank Michigan ahead of Arizona.<\/p>\n

Sports Roundup<\/p>\n

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The top tier<\/p>\n

Houston (21-2) moved up five spots to No. 3 after wins against UCF<\/a> and at BYU<\/a>, returning Kelvin Sampson\u2019s Cougars inside the top 5 after a November stint that included a week at No. 1.<\/p>\n

Duke held its position at No. 4 for a third consecutive week despite losing at rival North Carolina on Seth Trimble\u2019s last-second 3-pointer<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Iowa State was fifth, followed by UConn after the Huskies slid three spots following their loss to St. John\u2019s that ended an 18-game win streak<\/a>. Nebraska, Illinois, Kansas and Michigan State rounded out the top 10, with the Illini also falling three spots after their overtime road loss to the Spartans<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Rising<\/p>\n

St. John\u2019s jumped five spots to No. 17 to match Houston for the week\u2019s biggest jump after the UConn win, which pushed the Red Storm\u2019s winning streak to nine games entering this week.<\/p>\n

No. 11 UNC, No. 14 Florida and No. 15 Virginia all climbed three spots.<\/p>\n

In all, nine teams moved up from last week\u2019s position.<\/p>\n

Sliding<\/p>\n

No. 12 Gonzaga and No. 22 BYU shared honors for the week\u2019s biggest tumble by falling six spots. The Zags suffered their first loss since November by losing at Portland<\/a>, while the Cougars enter this week having lost four straight and five of six.<\/p>\n

No. 19 Vanderbilt fell four spots after a home loss to Oklahoma<\/a>, which dropped the Commodores to 3-4 since a 16-0 start.<\/p>\n

Seven teams fell from their position last week while remaining in the poll.<\/p>\n

Conference watch<\/p>\n

The Big 12 has a national-best six ranked teams, followed by the Big Ten and the Atlantic Coast Conference with five each. Of those leagues, the Big 12 and Big Ten each have four teams inside the top 10.<\/p>\n

The Southeastern Conference is next with four ranked teams, followed by the Big East with two. The West Coast Conference, Atlantic-10 and Mid-American Conference each have one.<\/p>\n

AP top 25RANKSCHOOLRECORD (1ST PLACE VOTES)POINTSPREVIOUS1Arizona23-0 (59)147512Michigan22-1141623Houston21-2127584Duke21-2125445Iowa State21-2124776UConn22-2122737Nebraska20-2109198Illinois20-4106059Kansas18-59661110Michigan State20-49291011North Carolina19-48631412Gonzaga23-2803613Purdue19-47851214Florida17-67181715Virginia20-36421816Texas Tech17-65491317St. John\u2019s18-55242218Saint Louis23-14221919Vanderbilt19-43751520Clemson20-43542021Arkansas17-63041522BYU17-61981623Miami (OH)24-01952324Louisville17-61822025Kentucky17-780NRWomen\u2019s AP college basketball poll: OU, Baylor, Texas Tech on the rise<\/a>North Texas sees growth in financial position in NCAA report for 2025 fiscal year<\/a><\/p>\n

Find more college sports coverage from The Dallas Morning News here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Arizona remained firmly atop The Associated Press Top 25 men\u2019s college basketball poll for a ninth consecutive week…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":593046,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3723],"tags":[7,2399,217,1529,231,772,1544,2400,14720,6775,9346,1153,2398,1640,2401],"class_list":["post-593045","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ncaa-basketball","tag-basketball","tag-baylor-bears","tag-college-basketball","tag-colleges","tag-ncaa","tag-ncaa-basketball","tag-ncaab","tag-oklahoma-sooners","tag-oklahoma-state-cowboys","tag-smu-mustangs","tag-tcu-horned-frogs","tag-texas-am-aggies","tag-texas-longhorns","tag-texas-tech-red-raiders","tag-unt-mean-green"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nba\/116042174513658014","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/593045","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=593045"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/593045\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/593046"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=593045"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=593045"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nba\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=593045"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}