Michigan Basketball moves up to #6 in AP Poll

Submitted by Wettin 3's on

Didn't think it was possible to ever go up in rankings after losing, but I guess the voters had a heart. Glad we went up from #7 to #6, after that heartbreaking defeat yesterday. Hopefully next week, we have a Big Ten Tournament Championship in the bag. GO BLUE!!

http://espn.go.com/mens-college-basketball/rankings

Butterfield

March 11th, 2013 at 2:02 PM ^

This seems to show that a lot of voters were actually watching the game and understand that only a remarkably unusual/bad final minute stood in the way of Michigan winning the game.  It sucks that we lost, and it sucks that THJ and Trey missed some FTs that would have iced it, but I came away more hopeful than I had been in quite some time about the team's tourney chances. 

Mturner

March 11th, 2013 at 2:46 PM ^

I agree, although we lost in heartbreaking fashion I feel a lot better about our chances in the NCAA tourney. We played pretty good defense (except boxing out) and went toe to toe with one of the best teams in the nation. I'm glad that our FT problem was highlighted for the coaches now than in the tourney.

ijohnb

March 11th, 2013 at 2:04 PM ^

I think Lunardi is jumping the gun taking us down to a 3 seed.  I mean yesterday was essentially a tie against a sure bet #1 seed.  If we make the Big Ten semis, I think we are a 2 over Ohio, over Florida, and over possibly over Kansas.  That is assuming that Ohio State does not win the BIG tourney.

Butterfield

March 11th, 2013 at 5:23 PM ^

Pretty sure he said "wins away from home", which are, you know, wins that occur outside of your home court. 

But that said, I don't totally disagree with you.  I think Michigan's resume outside of Ann Arbor is  slightly better than OSU's, but not by a whole heck of a lot.  Not enough to be any sort of deciding factor in a ranking IMO. 

ThWard

March 11th, 2013 at 2:19 PM ^

Wins against (current rankings) #11 Kansas State, #17 Pitt, #8 MSU, and #10 Ohio State (not to mention 3-0 against B1G tourney teams Illinois/Minnesota.

 

Heartbreakers agains #3 Indiana, #10 Ohio State, and #22 Wisconsin.

 

And a reminder that our fan base can go from down-and-out to utterly spoiled in a matter of two season.

 

Glad expectations have been raised, but by any account, Coach B and his team ought to be proud of the regular season. Time for a tourney run.

MGoRossGrad

March 11th, 2013 at 2:22 PM ^

It's amazing how prevalent the notion is that the B1G is the toughest conference in America.

Highest 5-loss team in the AP Poll:  Indiana

Highest 6-loss team in the AP Poll:  Michigan

Two highest 7-loss teams in the AP Poll:  Michigan State and Ohio State

Highest (and only) 10-loss team in the AP Poll:  Wisconsin

Four teams in the Top 10.

 

docwhoblocked

March 11th, 2013 at 2:59 PM ^

I am old enough to remember the 1989 season where we lost twice to an outstanding Illinois team before defeating them in the national semifinal.  Deja vue please!

LSAClassOf2000

March 11th, 2013 at 3:19 PM ^

The AP vote distribution for this week was as follows for Michigan:

- 3 votes for 4th place

- 6 votes for 5th place

- 24 votes for 6th place

- 12 votes for 7th place

- 9 votes for 8th place

- 4 votes for 9th place

- 3 votes fo 10th place

- 1 vote each for 11th, 12th, 14th and 15th (Randy Rosetta, Paul Zeise, Scott Wolf and Ryan Thorburn, rsepctively, per Pollspeak)

The average placement was 7.08, which is slightly lower than last week's 6.92.

Wherein the trivia begins:

The grand average placement in the raw vote for the regular season? 3.97

Of all the votes cast, the greatest number throughout the season were for 2nd place at 307, and the second greatest number would be the 248 3rd place votes.

jmblue

March 11th, 2013 at 3:24 PM ^

This is great.  I know the polls don't officially carry any weight, but still, the committee can't help seeing where we're ranked.

If we beat PSU and Wisconsin, I think we'll be a #2 seed, regardless of the outcome of the rest of the BTT.  But we've got to win those (especially PSU).

Jonesy

March 11th, 2013 at 6:06 PM ^

On the plus side, not getting that bye means we get to watch an extra michigan basketball game!  Anyways I found our play against MSU and IU heartening, I was worried we'd get blown out by both but we ended up accounting well for ourselves...That's not to say I didn't let out a mighty yell of despair after we missed two layups and then didnt even get a last 1.7s to play with on an out of bounds.

YoOoBoMoLloRoHo

March 11th, 2013 at 6:20 PM ^

painful to watch with the ball just rolling off, but enough folks see the utter fraction of inches vs IU and realize our comparability to a 1 seed.

Has to help with our ranking.