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Welcome to our series analyzing the women’s college basketball AP Top 25 poll. Every week, we look at the voters’ individual ballots and break down each team’s vote distribution.
The top seven teams stayed stable this week. In fact, for the sixth straight week, the top seven teams remained the same, though not always in the same order. The teams further down in the rankings saw real shifts, particularly with Florida St. and Maryland each falling several places and last week’s bottom three teams - Miami, Minnesota, and Texas - falling out entirely. South Dakota and Michigan returned to the top 25 while Princeton entered the poll for the first time this season at No. 25.
Interestingly, there were six pairs of teams where the lower-ranked team received more votes at the higher rank or above than the higher-ranked team. For example, No. 8 UCLA received 13 votes at No. 8 or higher while No. 9 NC State received 18 votes at No. 8 or higher. Due to how the votes were distributed and how points are calculated (25 points for a first-place vote, 24 points for a second-place vote, and so on), UCLA’s five votes at No. 6 were enough to push the Bruins ahead of the Wolfpack.
The other pairs of teams that showed this pattern were Texas A&M/Florida St., Mississippi St./Kentucky, Arizona/West Virginia, Missouri St./Arkansas, and South Dakota/Tennessee. Similar pairs can be found in previous weeks, but never more than three in a single poll.
A Closer Look
It’s easy to think of all 25 ranked teams as evenly spaced out in vote distribution, but the reality is that some teams’ vote totals are much closer than others. As alluded to above, several pairs of teams are particularly close in this week’s poll. In addition, Princeton received only one point more than Northwestern, who barely missed the top 25. Princeton’s 19 points is the lowest total for the No. 25 team this season by more than 20 points.
Fun Fact
This is Princeton’s third season and 14th week in the poll’s history. Princeton is the only Ivy League team to ever be ranked in the AP Top 25 Poll. Four other conferences have exactly one team who has made an appearance in the poll: ASUN (FGCU), Horizon (Green Bay), SWAC (Jackson St.), and WAC (New Mexico St.).
Historical data from acrossthetimeline.com.
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