ACC Teams Take Top Two Spots in AP Women’s Basketball Poll

The Atlantic Coast Conference has taken over the top two spots for the first time ever in the Associated Press women’s basketball poll, announced today.

Unbeaten Virginia (6-0) beat Old Dominion, Lafayette and Florida State and remained No. 1 for the fourth straight week with 61 of 62 first-place votes and 1,549 points--one short of perfect--from a panel of women’s coaches.

North Carolina State (6-0), which is expected to challenge the Lady Cavaliers for the ACC title, moved up a step into second place with the remaining first-place vote and 1,482 points. The ranking matches the all-time high for the Wolfpack, last achieved in February, 1978.

Long Beach State (4-1) stayed at 11th with 966 points.

Evicted from the top 25 was USC, which lost to unranked San Francisco, 90-77.

Overall, five teams in the first 10 and nine overall from last week’s poll suffered defeats.

Purdue’s jump from ninth to fourth and Northwestern’s climb from 10th to sixth mark only the second time the Big Ten has had two teams among the top six in the poll. Iowa and Ohio State occupied spots in that group at the end of the 1987-88 season.

Louisiana Tech’s upset loss Saturday at then-No. 24 LSU brought Coach Leon Barmore’s team down from fifth to seventh, its lowest ranking since Feb. 2, 1987, when it was eighth. It also ended 36 straight top five appearances. Overall, Louisiana Tech has been in the top five in 58 of the last 59 weeks.

Mississippi’s move to eighth from 12th marked its highest ranking since Feb. 6, 1989, while Penn State, which moved to a point behind the Rebels at ninth from 13th, reached its highest ranking since Dec. 1, 1985, and the first top 10 appearance by the Lions since Dec. 15 of that year.

THE TOP 25

The top 25 women’s basketball teams in the AP poll; 1st-place votes in parentheses. 1. Virginia (61) 6-0 2. N. Carolina State (1) 6-0 3. Georgia 3-0 4. Purdue 4-0 5. Auburn 3-1 6. Northwestern 3-0 7. Louisiana Tech. 3-1 8. Mississippi 5-0 9. Penn State 5-0 10. Tennessee 3-2 11. Long Beach State 4-1 12. Stanford 3-2 13. Arkansas 6-1 14. UNLV 4-0 15. Iowa 5-1 16. Clemson 5-0 17. Washington 4-1 18. Rutgers 4-0 19. LSU 4-2 20. N. Illinois 6-1 21. Texas 2-3 22. Providence 7-0 23. Connecticut 5-2 24. Oklahoma State 6-0 25. Maryland 4-3