Where Kentucky women’s basketball stands in the national rankings after loss to UNC
The Kentucky Wildcats’ spot in the national rankings took a minor hit following their first loss of the season, a 72-53 defeat to then-No. 16 North Carolina in Chapel Hill on Dec. 5 during the 2024 SEC/ACC Challenge.
The Wildcats — who ranked No. 14 last week — swapped places with the Tar Heels (9-1) in this week’s iteration of the Associated Press Top 25 women’s basketball rankings, and now stand at No. 16.
Kentucky (7-1) is one of seven members of the Southeastern Conference represented in the Week 6 rankings — South Carolina (9-1) stayed put at No. 3 after defeating then-No. 8 Duke and then-No. 9 TCU in back-to-back top-10 wins. LSU (11-0) jumped up one spot to No. 4, while Texas (8-1) fell two spots to No. 6 after an overtime road loss to then-No. 10 Notre Dame and a win over unranked James Madison. Oklahoma (8-1) improved to No. 10 thanks to its SEC/ACC Challenge win at then-No. 22 Louisville.
Still-undefeated Tennessee (7-0), in its first season under Kim Caldwell, remained at No. 19 after wins over Florida State and Iowa. Ole Miss (6-3) dropped four spots after a road loss to No. 22 North Carolina State. The Rebels and the Wolfpack now share the No. 22 spot. Alabama (9-1), ranked No. 19 last week, fell out of the rankings after a 69-65 loss to California in yet another SEC casualty in the conference battle.
Only eight teams in the top 25 have yet to drop a game — No. 1 UCLA (9-0), No. 2 Connecticut (8-0), LSU, No. 7 Maryland (10-0), No. 11 Ohio State (8-0), No. 17 Michigan State (9-0), Tennessee and No. 25 Georgia Tech (9-0).
In his postgame comments with the UK Network’s Darren Headrick after the loss to North Carolina, first-year Kentucky head coach Kenny Brooks said he never expected UK to go undefeated this season.
“You never want to lose, no one ever wants to lose,” Brooks said. “But it’s inevitable. I don’t think anybody’s going to go undefeated this year, and what do you do with the loss? Do you learn from it? Do you dwell on it? We have a lot to learn from. But in no way, shape or form did I think that we were going to go undefeated. ...
“We have a lot to learn from this long season. And, you know, this is a good team we played. It’s not like, ‘OK, we just came out and laid an egg.’ You see it all across college athletics, you look at Kansas men (Dec. 4), they lost to a good Creighton team. But it happens. The good thing is that it only counts as one loss, and then we’ll get back after it. But there’s a lot to learn from this.”
The week’s biggest jump was made by Michigan State, which improved seven spots to No. 17 after an 89-61 home victory over DePaul. The Spartans’ résumé also boasts wins over California and Vanderbilt. TCU (9-1) dropped three spots to No. 12 after its 85-52 loss to South Carolina. Iowa (8-1) joined Ole Miss in dropping four spots after the Hawkeyes’ loss to the Lady Vols. Louisville (5-4) fell out of the rankings after consecutive losses to Oklahoma and Connecticut.
NET rankings update
As expected, the Wildcats’ stock in the NCAA NET rankings also slightly dropped.
Though updated daily based on the results of all games across women’s college basketball, the NET rankings’ season debut arrived Dec. 2 and rated Kentucky at No. 22 in the country. After taking what will be deemed a Quad One loss to North Carolina (currently rated No. 16 in the NET) — in conjunction with the rest of the action across Division I basketball last week — UK now sits at No. 33.
At the time of the writing of this article, the SEC had 11 teams in the NET’s top 50, and eight in the top 25. South Carolina continues its stronghold at No. 1, while No. 4 Texas and No. 8 Vanderbilt remain in the top 10.
The remaining members of the NET top 10 are No. 2 Connecticut, No. 3 Kansas State, No. 5 UCLA, No. 6 Michigan State, No. 7 Notre Dame, No. 9 TCU and No. 10 Duke.
No. 11 LSU, No. 14 Oklahoma, No. 18 Ole Miss, No. 20 Mississippi State, No. 21 Alabama, No. 27 Tennessee and No. 48 Auburn are all favorably positioned as conference play inches closer.
No. 58 Missouri, No. 63 Florida and No. 97 Texas A&M also sit in the top 100, while No. 127 Arkansas (6-5) and No. 162 Georgia (5-5) have struggled during the nonconference slate.
Monday
No. 14 Kentucky vs. Queens University of Charlotte
When: 6 p.m.
Where: Memorial Coliseum
TV: SEC Network+ (online only)
Radio: WLAP-AM 630
Records: UK 7-1, Queens 5-3
This story was originally published December 9, 2024 at 2:30 PM.
