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College basketball rankings: Villanova wins Battle 4 Atlantis title, moves into Top 25 And 1 – CBS Sports
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Villanova entered the Battle 4 Atlantis without a number next to its name because of a 76-72 loss to Penn early last week that dropped the Wildcats from 21st to unranked in the Associated Press Top 25 poll and from 23rd to unranked in the CBS Sports Top 25 And 1. As I wrote the following morning, that loss as a 12.5-point favorite represented the fifth time in Kyle Neptune’s first 37 games as Jay Wright’s successor that the 38-year-old coach fell to a sub-100 team at KenPom.com.
Not good.
But it’s been all good since then.
The Wildcats bounced-back from their loss to Penn with a 57-40 win over Maryland, then extended their winning streak to four games with victories in the Bahamas over Texas Tech, North Carolina and Memphis to secure the Battle 4 Atlantis trophy.
All five starters reached double-figures vs. Memphis.
Villanova led Penny Hardaway’s Tigers by as many as 35 points Friday before cruising to a 79-63 victory. The dominant win pushed the Wildcats to No. 17 in Saturday morning’s updated Top 25 And 1 and reestablished the three-time national champions as real challengers to Marquette, UConn and Creighton in the Big East.
“Just proud of my guys and coaches for sticking together throughout the week,” said Villanova’s Justin Moore, who had 11 points against Memphis and is now averaging a team-high 15.6 points, 3.7 rebounds and 2.3 assists in 29.7 minutes per game. “We put a lot of work in each and every day. So just us grinding and coming together is what I’m proud of.”
Up next four Villanova is a four-game stretch that will offer consistent challenges for different reasons. Here’s the schedule:
That’s a Big Five game against Saint Joe’s followed by three straight matchups with top-40 KenPom teams, two of which — at Kansas State and at Creighton — will be played on the road. A 3-1 record in that stretch would be terrific, 2-2 acceptable.
IN: Villanova, North Carolina, Oklahoma, BYU | OUT: Arkansas, USC, Iowa State, Alabama
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