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AP College Basketball Poll 2018: Complete Week 3 Rankings Released

Tyler Conway

For the most part, the Associated Press Top 25 men's basketball poll saw few changes from last week.

The ones that did happen, however, were pretty seismic.

Duke remains the nation's top-ranked team and is followed by Kansas, with Gonzaga, Virginia and Tennessee rounding out the Top Five. That's unchanged. Looking down further in the Top 10, you'll no longer see defending champion Villanova, as the Wildcats dropped all the way out of the rankings after a shocking two-loss week.

Here's now the entire Top 25 played out:

1. Duke

2. Kansas

3. Gonzaga

4. Virginia

5. Tennessee

6. Nevada

7. North Carolina

8. Auburn

9. Michigan

10. Kentucky

11. Michigan State

12. Kansas State

13. Virginia Tech

14. Florida State

15. Mississippi State

16. Clemson

17. UCLA

18. TCU

19. LSU

20. Iowa

21. Oregon

22. Buffalo

23. Ohio State

24. Purdue

25. Wisconsin

        

The Wildcats' horrific week started out with Michigan throttling them in a 73-46 blowout. In the national championship rematch, the Wolverines shot 50.9 percent from the floor while the Wildcats looked listless on both ends of the floor. Villanova shot 31.8 percent and had seven more turnovers (21) than field goals (14).

Jay Wright's team compounded that with a shocking loss to Furman, continuing to struggle mightily from the floor. Villanova is the first defending national champion to start the following year 2-2 since UCLA in 1995.

"We're trying to work out a lot of chemistry things with our team. We have a lot of new guys," Villanova guard Phil Booth told reporters. "We're trying to play more together and figure things out."

Also taking a tumble out of the rankings is Syracuse, which dropped games to UConn and Oregon last week. The Orange defense struggled in both games, allowing their opponents to score 80-plus points. 

"I think it's the first time in 30 years we've lost two games in a preseason tournament," Syracuse coach Jim Boeheim told reporters. "This is a lowlight."

Oregon had lost earlier in the week to Iowa, setting up the Syracuse clash. The Ducks dropped eight spots to No. 21.

Michigan was the most ascendant team of the week, moving up from No. 18 to No. 9.

No. 20 Iowa, No. 23 Ohio State and No. 25 Wisconsin moved into the Top 25. Marquette joined Villanova and Syracuse as the two teams moving down. 

   

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