After it took some time, maybe too much time, to go from being unranked to making their way in the polls, the Iowa Hawkeyes appear to have earned respect to hold steady in the polls despite a slip-up.
The Hawkeyes dropped their first game of the year to the Tennessee Volunteers by a score of 78-68 in the Champions Classic in New York.
The loss wasn’t too terribly bad for the Hawkeyes as the Volunteers currently find themselves sitting at No. 18 in the AP Top 25 women’s college basketball poll. Iowa is sitting at No. 24 after a small slide down the rankings.
One ranking that gave the Hawkeyes even more respect is CBS. The CBS Sports women’s college basketball power rankings only dropped Iowa one spot with the loss. They went from No. 20 to No. 21.
They do still sit right behind the Volunteers who jumped into the power rankings this week going from unranked to No. 20.
The Hawkeyes get two chances this week to make a statement to the rest of the women’s college basketball world with back-to-back games against ranked opponents in four days.
First is a home game on Wednesday, Dec. 11 against in-state rival, the Iowa State Cyclones, in the Cy-Hawk rivalry. At 8-2, the Cyclones are currently No. 17 in the AP Top 25.
Following that, Iowa makes a road trip to East Lansing, Michigan on Sunday, Dec. 15 for a ranked Big Ten battle against the No. 19 Michigan State Spartans who are 9-0.
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