Kentucky’s win over Louisville impresses voters. Cats jump Duke in new Top 25 rankings.

With no upsets at the very top of the men’s college basketball rankings last week, there weren’t any major shifts when the new Associated Press Top 25 poll was released Monday afternoon.

But Kentucky still moved up a spot.

The Wildcats jumped from No. 5 to No. 4 in the latest rankings, leapfrogging Duke to gain one spot from last week’s poll.

Tennessee held on to the top spot in the rankings, followed by No. 2 Auburn and No. 3 Iowa State, with Duke falling one spot to No. 5 after a 72-46 win over Incarnate Word in its lone game of the week. UK defeated the Blue Devils in the Champions Classic in Atlanta on Nov. 12.

That group was followed by No. 6 Alabama, No. 7 Florida, No. 8 Kansas, No. 9 Marquette and No. 10 Oregon.

Kentucky improved to 10-1 in Mark Pope’s first season as head coach with a 78-67 victory over Colgate last Wednesday and a 93-85 win over Louisville in the rivalry game Saturday night. The Cats were No. 23 in the AP preseason poll, and this is their third consecutive week in the top five of the national rankings. This is the first time since the 2021-22 season that UK has spent three straight weeks in the top five.

Kentucky has just one game this week — Ohio State in the CBS Sports Classic in Madison Square Garden at 5:30 p.m. Saturday — and then the Cats will be off until a New Year’s Eve clash with Brown in Rupp Arena.

The Buckeyes (6-4) were No. 21 in the first AP poll of the regular season and have been projected as an NCAA Tournament team, but they have lost three of their last four games, including a 91-53 rout at the hands of No. 2 Auburn in Atlanta on Saturday.

Auburn’s lopsided victory over Ohio State was another sign of the SEC’s dominance in the early weeks of the 2024-25 season. The conference now has eight teams in the AP Top 25, with No. 12 Texas A&M, No. 14 Oklahoma and No. 17 Ole Miss joining top-10 teams Tennessee, Auburn, Kentucky, Alabama and Florida.

Mississippi State, Arkansas and Missouri were the top three teams in the “others receiving votes” category of Monday’s poll. Georgia and Texas also got votes this week.

Only four teams in Division I have perfect records going into this week, and three of them — Tennessee, Florida and Oklahoma (all 10-0) — are in the SEC. (The other is Utah State, which is also 10-0, plays in the Mountain West Conference, and hasn’t beaten any team rated higher than No. 45 in the latest KenPom ratings.)

Kentucky will get Florida in Rupp Arena for the SEC opener on Jan. 4. The Gators play North Carolina in Charlotte on Tuesday night — then have games against North Florida and Stetson — to round out their nonconference schedule before coming to Lexington.

This story was originally published December 16, 2024 at 1:13 PM.

Ben Roberts

Lexington Herald-Leader

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Ben Roberts is the University of Kentucky men’s basketball beat writer for the Lexington Herald-Leader. He has previously specialized in UK basketball recruiting coverage and created and maintained the Next Cats blog. He is a Franklin County native and first joined the Herald-Leader in 2006. Support my work with a digital subscription