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The Southeastern Conference has both top-tier teams as well as depth this season with five schools ranked in the first seven of The Associated Press women’s basketball poll.
Overall nine teams are in the Top 25, tying the Big Ten for the most ever in a single week in the 50-year history of the poll.
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South Carolina leads the way at No. 2 with Texas fourth, Vanderbilt fifth, LSU sixth and Kentucky seventh.
The Gamecocks and Longhorns meet in South Carolina in a key conference matchup. Texas coach Vic Schaefer vented his frustrations after his team lost 70-65 at LSU. The veteran coach wasn’t happy with the scheduling that his team would have to play both LSU and South Carolina on the road in consecutive games.
"I have to play South Carolina on the road this year as well as LSU. I get them back-to-back in the same week,” he said. “Now, make that make sense. So, the league is hard enough as it is. … It really has a stench to it. And the common denominator is LSU and South Carolina both played Georgia before they played me. And South Carolina was at home today. … I’m really disappointed in the league for putting our kids in that position.”
Texas has to play LSU twice this season after playing South Carolina twice in conference play last year. The Longhorns and Gamecocks already played this year in Thanksgiving tournament.
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There are few easy nights in the conference with so many ranked opponents. Besides the ones in the top 10, Oklahoma is 13th, Ole Miss 16th, Tennessee 20th and Alabama 21st.
Triangle outage
For the first time in nine years, Duke, North Carolina and N.C. State all aren’t ranked in the Top 25 after the Tar Heels dropped out. The last time that happened was Nov. 28, 2016. The trio started this season all in the top 11 of the poll with Duke seventh, N.C. State ninth and North Carolina 11th. Duke fell out in the third week and N.C. State in the fifth. North Carolina saw it’s run of being ranked in 30 consecutive polls end.
NET rating
With teams having most of last week off for the holidays, there wasn’t much change in the NET ratings. UConn still holds the top spot with UCLA, South Carolina and Texas next. LSU is fifth.
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Princeton and North Dakota State are the top mid-major teams coming in at 37 and 44, respectively.
The NET is just one tool the NCAA selection committee uses to figure out which teams make the NCAA Tournament and where they are seeded. It has predicted the winner pretty accurately since it first was used in 2021. Four of the five national champions were No. 1 in the NET on Selection Sunday.
Games of the week
No. 15 Michigan State at No. 11 Iowa. Two of the top teams in the Big Ten square off in a key matchup. The Hawkeyes are 5-0 in the conference and the Spartans are 5-1.
No. 12 Maryland at No. 3 UCLA. The Terrapins head out west this week for games against USC and UCLA. With two losses already in the Big Ten Conference, Maryland can ill afford to lose many more games if they hope to win the regular season crown.
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