Villanova No. 1 in AP Top 25 for second time in school history

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Thursday, December 8, 2016

Reigning national champion Villanova is No. 1 in The Associated Press Top 25 men's college basketball poll for the second time in school history.

The Wildcats (8-0), who were No. 1 for three weeks in February last season, moved up one spot from last week with 57 first-place votes from the 65-member national media panel Monday.

UCLA (9-0), which beat then-No. 1 Kentucky 97-92 on Saturday, jumped from 11th to second with two first-place votes. Kentucky, which dropped to sixth, had been No. 1 for the past two weeks. No. 5 Duke is the other team to be No. 1 this season, for two weeks.

Kansas came in at No. 3 and was followed by Baylor(8-0), which received six first-place votes. After Duke and Kentucky, North Carolina, Gonzaga, Indiana and Creighton rounded out the top 10.

Villanova was playing Saturday afternoon when the Kentucky game ended. During the latter stages of an 88-57 victory over Saint Joseph's, the Villanova students started chanting "No. 1! No. 1!" They have their wish.

Louisville is 11th, followed by Saint Mary's, Xavier, Virginia and West Virginia, which made the jump from 25th to 15th after winning at Virginia, dropping the Cavaliers from sixth.

Butler is 16th followed by Wisconsin, Purdue, South Carolina and Arizona. The last five ranked teams are Florida, Cincinnati, Notre Dame, Oregon and Iowa State.

Cincinnati (7-1), which won at Iowa State last week, moved back into the Top 25 after being out for three weeks. Notre Dame (8-0) is the week's other newcomer. The Fighting Irish come in having scored at least 91 points in their last three games.

Rhode Island dropped out from 21st after losing to Valparaiso and Providence last week. Syracuse, which was 22nd, fell out after losing to Wisconsin in the ACC/Big Ten Challenge.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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