The Duke Blue Devils have won four straight games to build an 8-2 resume, and college basketball analyst Andy Katz now considers [autotag]Cooper Flagg[/autotag] and his teammates a top-five team in the country once again.
Katz released his weekly power rankings on Monday, and the Blue Devils shuffled up one spot to No. 5 despite a meandering victory over Incarnate Word last Tuesday.
“Duke has done a tremendous job of beating the teams soundly that it should,” Katz wrote. “The ACC is Duke’s to lose.”
The Blue Devils pulled away from the Cardinals in the second half to end up with a 26-point victory by the time the buzzer sounded, their fifth 20-point win of the season. Duke outscored Louisville 43-28 after halftime in its first ACC game of the season, and its 84-78 victory over the Auburn Tigers is one of the nation’s best wins in 2024-25.
The Tigers stayed second on Katz’s board behind the Tennessee Volunteers, and Iowa State and the Kentucky Wildcats followed suit in the same order as the USA TODAY Sports men’s basketball coaches poll.
The Clemson Tigers (No. 15) were the only other ACC team included among Katz’s top 37 teams.