It is officially March, and we are less than two weeks away from Selection Sunday. Jon Scheyer’s team is playing some of their best basketball of the season, and they look like a team starting to find itself at the perfect time. They enter Monday in second place in the ACC with a week ahead of them that features two games against two of their fiercest ACC rivals, NC State and UNC.
Duke will enter their Monday night matchup on the road against NC State as the 9th-ranked team in the country after they moved up one spot in the latest and penultimate AP poll of the 2023-2024 regular season.
Houston survived a valiant upset bid from Oklahoma on Saturday in head coach Kelvin Sampson’s return to Norman thanks to the late-game heroics of soon-to-be All-American guard Jamal Shead. The Cougars won 87-85. UCONN moved to number two as they secured the Big East regular season title, while Purdue slid one spot to third in the latest poll. Tennessee remained in contention for a number-one seed after they dispatched an electric Alabama team on Saturday in Alabama.
With Marquette’s loss to Creighton, the Golden Eagles fell to 8th, allowing Arizona, Iowa State, and the Tar Heels to take over the fifth, sixth, and seventh spots, respectively. With Duke at nine, Creighton rounds out the top ten after they moved up 12 spots.
Duke and UNC remain the lone ACC teams in the top 25, while none of the other ACC teams are even receiving votes. If Duke takes down NC State and beats North Carolina at home, the Blue Devils will earn at least a share of the ACC regular season title and should put themselves firmly in contention for a two-seed with a great showing in the ACC Tournament.