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College Basketball Talk’s Latest Top 25: How far will Wisconsin and Gonzaga fall?

John Calipari, Andrew Harrison, Tyler Ulis

AP Photo

AP

John Calipari, Andrew Harrison, Tyler Ulis

AP Photo

AP

1. Kentucky (29-0, LW: No. 1): Ho-hum, just another pair of blowout wins for the Wildcats. March Madness can’t get here soon enough. Here’s what I’m hoping happens: Kentucky has to beat Wisconsin, Virginia and Arizona or Duke to win the national title. I want to see them challenged. Seeing this team coast to No. 9 without beating anyone higher than a No. 3 seed would not only be boring, but it would result in their season having an asterisk next to it. I can see the headlines now: “Kentucky might be the greatest team ever, but we’ll never know because they were never tested.” That would get annoying really, really quick.

2. Virginia (27-1, LW: No. 4): No Justin Anderson, no problem. London Perrantes breaks his nose, Virginia beats Wake Forest by 36 on the road. They just keep on winning. We can only hope Anderson gets healthy. This team deserves to be at 100 percent in March.

3. Wisconsin (26-3, LW: No. 2): The Badgers picked up their first loss since January on Tuesday, as they went into College Park and lost to a Maryland team that is going to find themselves in the top ten of every poll in the country on Monday morning. What a devastating blow! I won’t mention the part about how the Terps matchup very well with Wisconsin, or how the Badgers missed a number of very good looks at threes in the first half, a major reason they found themselves down 11 at the break. The only real damage from that loss? It hurts their chances of getting a No. 1 seed, and may set them up for a date with Kentucky in the Elite 8.

4. Duke (26-3, LW: No. 5): As good as Duke’s wins are this season, I still have my doubts about their ability to win a national title. Their defensive issues are a major, major problem -- it almost cost them against Virginia Tech -- but that’s not it. Duke has four different guys that can take over a game when Justise Winslow plays the way he did this past week. But they lack depth and balance beyond that, which says nothing about how badly they need a stretch four or another big, athletic wing. The advantage that Duke gets when playing Winslow at the four is negated by the fact that they have to play either Matt Jones (too small) or Grayson Allen (not ready) at the three, and Amile Jefferson isn’t a good enough shooter to make it difficult for opposing defenses to smother Jahlil Okafor with big-to-big doubles.

5. Villanova (27-2, LW: No. 6): The Wildcats just keep winning. They clinched the outright Big East title this week with a 28 point win over Providence on Tuesday, following that up with an impressive win at Xavier over the weekend.

6. Arizona (26-3, LW: No. 7): The Wildcats have clinched a share of the Pac-12 title, and as long as they beat either Cal or Stanford at home next week, they will be the outright league champs. Sean Miller’s club seems to have shaken off their road struggles, and while they still have some issues with their perimeter shooting, Arizona can really, really defend. Also, it’s good to see Kaleb Tarczewski starting to play like a former top ten recruit.

7. Gonzaga (29-2, LW: No. 3): I can understand why Gonzaga lost on Saturday night. They were distracted by Senior Night in a game that didn’t mean much to them and that gave life to BYU’s season. It happens. But it doesn’t explain why the Zags have not looked like themselves over the course of the last three weeks.

8. Kansas (23-6, LW: No. 8): I still think that Kansas is one of the top eight teams in the country, but it’s going to be interesting to see what happens with Cliff Alexander. He wasn’t playing all that effectively to begin with, but without him, the Jayhawks have a massive hole in their front line. At least Alexander provided them with some athleticism and physicality up front. The Jayhawks all but have a No. 2 seed locked up because of how strong their schedule is, but I think there’s a real gap between them and the rest of the top seven.

9. Maryland (24-5, LW: No. 17): After knocking off Wisconsin on Tuesday, the Terps are getting a bump into the top ten. I’ll be honest: after seeing them in person, I’m not convinced this is actually one of the top ten teams in the country. I’m also not convinced this is a team that can make the Final Four. But I don’t known if any of the teams below them can do that either.

10. Baylor (22-7, LW: No. 15): Has there been a hotter team in the country over the course of the last two weeks than Baylor? The run that they used to beat Iowa State in Ames on Wednesday -- hitting six threes in six possessions -- was impressive. It’s fluky, yes, but it shows you how dangerous this group is.

11. Utah (22-6, LW: No. 10)
12. Notre Dame (24-5, LW: No. 9)
13. Wichita State (27-3, LW: No. 14)
14. Northern Iowa (27-3, LW: No. 13)
15. North Carolina (20-9, LW: No. 11)
16. Oklahoma (20-8, LW: No. 16)
17. Iowa State (20-8, LW: No. 12)
18. West Virginia (22-7, LW: No. 18)
19. SMU (23-6, LW: No. 19)
20. Arkansas (22-5, LW: No. 20)
21. Butler (21-8, LW: No. 21)
22. Ohio State (21-8, LW: No. 22)
23. Louisville (23-6, LW: No. 25)
24. St. John’s (20-9, LW: UR)
25. Boise State (22-7, LW: UR)

Dropped Out: No. 23 Providence, No. 24 VCU

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