Kentucky basketball makes big move in new national rankings after top-10 win over Florida
The Kentucky Wildcats made another major statement on the basketball court Saturday.
They were rewarded with another rise in the national rankings two days later.
UK moved up four spots to the No. 6 position in the new Associated Press Top 25 poll, which was released Monday afternoon, 48 hours after the Cats defeated then-No. 6 Florida 106-100 in Rupp Arena.
The Gators, who came into the SEC opener with a perfect 13-0 record, fell two spots to the No. 8 ranking in the new poll.
Kentucky, which started the season at No. 23 in the AP preseason poll, has now been ranked in the top 10 for eight consecutive weeks, the program’s longest such streak since the end of the 2018-19 season, when the Cats advanced to the Elite Eight (and the last time they made it past the first week of the NCAA Tournament).
This UK team has a long way to go before March Madness, with 17 regular-season games remaining in an SEC gauntlet that tipped off over the weekend.
Tennessee remains No. 1 in the AP Top 25, and the Volunteers (14-0) are now the nation’s only undefeated team after beating John Calipari’s Arkansas Razorbacks 76-52 on Saturday. Florida and Oklahoma also went into the weekend unbeaten, but they both lost their conference openers.
Fellow SEC power Auburn is still No. 2 in the AP rankings — but No. 1 in the NCAA’s NET and KenPom ratings — after beating Missouri 84-68 in the league opener. Iowa State, Duke and Alabama remained in the 3-4-5 spots in the new poll.
Following Kentucky in the No. 6 spot, Marquette moved up one position to No. 7 in the rankings, followed by No. 8 Florida, No. 9 UConn and then Texas A&M rounding out the top 10 and giving the SEC a total of six teams in that range.
Other SEC programs in the new rankings were No. 14 Mississippi State, No. 17 Oklahoma and No. 23 Ole Miss. Arkansas, which was No. 23 in last week’s poll, dropped out of the Top 25, lowering the SEC’s number of teams in the national rankings to nine. The Razorbacks were 27th in this week’s voting, with Georgia, Missouri and Vanderbilt also receiving votes.
Kansas and Oregon joined Florida as top-10 teams that lost last week, giving Kentucky a path to make its move up the rankings. The Cats are now 3-2 in Quad 1 games — an important separator on NCAA Tournament résumés — with the win over Florida joining the neutral-court victories over Duke (in Atlanta) and Gonzaga (in Seattle).
Both of UK’s games this week will be Quad 1 matchups on the road.
The Cats play at Georgia on Tuesday night and then travel to No. 14 Mississippi State on Saturday night. In fact, Kentucky’s next six games are all currently classified as Quad 1s. After this week, UK will play No. 10 Texas A&M and No. 5 Alabama at home, then top-ranked Tennessee and Vanderbilt on the road.
The next non-Quad 1 game on UK’s schedule is the much anticipated matchup with Calipari’s Razorbacks in Rupp Arena on Feb. 1.
This story was originally published January 6, 2025 at 1:30 PM.
