College Basketball Rankings 2014-15: Bleacher Report's Week 5 Top 25

Kentucky, you have a challenger.

That's the best news that came out of this past week of college basketball. Even if you hate Kentucky and Duke, if you're a college basketball fan, you have to be excited about the possibility of those two behemoths squaring off in the national championship game in April.

The Blue Devils offense has approached Kentucky's defense in how categorically dominant it has been. The win at Wisconsin for Duke legitimized that this group is not just ridiculously talented but also already playing at an extremely high level.

This past week also started to show that there seems to be 14 teams who have separated themselves, and after that tier, you might as well just then mix the teams up in a hat and pick. All three voters—myself, Jason King and Kerry Miller—had the same top 14 teams in some order.

We also agreed on who the top five teams are, just in different orders. As for the top two, there were no disagreements.

Dropped from rankings: Illinois, Arkansas, West Virginia, Michigan State, Michigan

Also receiving votes: Seton Hall, Baylor, Michigan State

All advanced stats, unless otherwise noted, were via kenpom.com (subscription required). 

25-21: Maryland-St. John's

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25. Maryland (Previous rank: 25): The Terps should be able to survive another three weeks without Dez Wells, who is missing in action because of a fractured wrist. They hung in with Virginia—losing by 10—and the schedule is pretty soft until the Big Ten opener on Dec. 30 at Michigan State.

24. Butler (Previous rank: NR): Comparisons are starting to be made between Butler interim coach Chris Holtmann and former coach Brad Stevens. Similar to Stevens' teams, the Bulldogs are excelling on the defensive end this year. The one big difference is Holtmann's group is forcing more turnovers than a typical Stevens-coached team, turning opponents over on one-fourth of their possessions. 

23. North Carolina (Previous rank: 12): North Carolina showed up on only one poll this week—Mr. Kerry Miller's—but Miller must not be fretting too much over the loss to Iowa because he has UNC at No. 17. The talent is there for the Heels to be top 10, but they need someone to be a scorer/outside threat and help take some pressure off of Marcus Paige.

22. Colorado State (Previous rank: NR): Larry Eustachy wasn't expected to have a great team. The Rams were picked to finish fifth in the Mountain West. But Eustachy always gets the most out of his talent and it appears he has a very unselfish team. The Rams average 16.4 assists per game and have four players averaging double figures and two others at better than 8.0 points per game.

21. St. John's (Previous rank: NR): The Johnnies are finally playing to their talent after underachieving the last few seasons. One big difference has been getting more minutes out of shot-blocking specialist Chris Obekpa—hard to bench those short shorts (see pic). Obekpa was huge Saturday in a win over Syracuse, blocking four shots and pulling down 16 rebounds in 39 minutes.

20-16: Northern Iowa-Washington

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20. Northern Iowa (Previous rank: 24): The Panthers don't have a great win, but they do have a couple decent wins—at Stephen F. Austin, Virginia Tech on a neutral floor and Northwestern on a neutral floor—and a chance to really prove themselves the next two Saturdays with games against VCU and Iowa.

19. Notre Dame (Previous rank: NR): If you were picking a player of the year after the first month of the season, Notre Dame senior Jerian Grant would have to be in the conversation. Grant is averaging 19.0 points, 6.4 assists, 3.6 rebounds and 1.7 steals per game. The Irish are 8-1—the only loss coming by one point to Providence—and Grant had 27 points, six assists and three steals in last Wednesday's overtime win over Michigan State.

18. Miami (Previous rank: 18): The Hurricanes have been extremely reliant on transfers Sheldon McClellan and Angel Rodriguez. That's why a loss to Green Bay on Saturday wasn't all that surprising considering Rodriguez made just two of the 15 shots he took. 

17. San Diego State (Previous rank: 13): The Aztecs are incredibly gifted on the defensive end, but scoring can be a chore, and that was obviously the case in the 49-36 loss on Sunday at Washington. SDSU's five starters combined for 4-of-36 shooting from the field. Ick!

16. Washington (Previous rank: NR): The Huskies look like they would like to save Lorenzo Romar's job. The latest win against San Diego State showed that Washington's undefeated start is no fluke. Sophomore point guard Nigel Williams-Goss, who had 15 points, is reminding folks why he was a McDonald's All-American coming out of high school. 

15-11: Ohio State-Iowa State

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15. Ohio State (Previous rank: 19): The Buckeyes have a much higher ceiling this season than last year because of the offense that freshman guard D'Angelo Russell has brought to the table. Not only is Russell averaging a team-best 18.0 points per game, he's been a good setup man as well, chipping in 5.4 assists per game from the two-guard spot.

14. Oklahoma (Previous rank: 16): OU is the best two-loss team in the country. Unlike last season, the Sooners are playing great defense and with great effort on that end, ranking sixth in Pomeroy's adjusted defensive efficiency compared to 91st last year. 

13. Utah (Previous rank: 22): The overtime win against Wichita State got our attention. Everyone knew coming into the season that the Utes had a star and future pro at point guard in Delon Wright. What we didn't know is Utah had a second future pro in Jakob Poeltl, the freshman 7-footer who is averaging 12.0 points, 9.6 rebounds and 3.0 blocks per game. Utah has a chance this Saturday against Kansas to get another statement win.

12. Wichita State (Previous rank: 10): Don't be surprised if Wichita State ends up as a very high seed again this year. The loss to Utah wasn't a bad loss, and it easily could have gone the other way. Fred VanVleet surprisingly missed the front end of a one-and-one free throw in overtime with his team trailing by one point. The Shockers miss the scoring of Cleanthony Early, but Ron Baker, averaging 17.8 points per game, has helped fill that void and is playing at an All-American level.

11. Iowa State (Previous rank: 17): The Cyclones tried to do too much individually in their lone loss to Maryland, finishing with a season-low eight assists. They've had 45 assists in the two games since and ran Arkansas off the court this past week with a 95-77 win.

10. Texas

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Record: 7-1

Previous rank: 6

The Longhorns just simply didn't have enough offense without point guard Isaiah Taylor to hang with Kentucky for 40 minutes.

Even with Taylor, the Horns are not quite at UK's level on the offensive end. But they are as close as anyone when it comes to half-court defense.

That's one reason Kansas should be very concerned about the Big 12 race. Similar to playing Kentucky, thou shall proceed with caution when attacking the bucket against Texas.

The Horns are blocking nearly one-fourth (24.2 percent) of opponents' shots that come at the rim, according to hoop-math.com. It's quite the luxury having five players in the rotation 6'8" or taller. 

9. Kansas

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Record: 6-1

Previous rank: 9

The Jayhawks are a roller-coaster on both ends so far this year. When opponents had been able to take away Perry Ellis, as Florida was able to do on Friday, the offense had looked lost until Wayne Selden put his cape on and saved KU from what would have been a bad loss at home.

The offense could continue to be an adventure unless Selden really did get things figured out against the Gators, so to truly be a top 10 team, the Jayhawks need to start bringing it for 40 minutes on the defensive end.

They have shown the potential to be elite on that end in the second halves of the last two games. First, they held Michigan State to 20 points on 8-of-33 shooting and Florida to 26 points on 10-of-29 shooting.

Kansas has its most difficult stretch of the nonconference (sans Kentucky) coming up this week with a trip to Georgetown on Wednesday and a game Saturday against Utah in Kansas City. A bad half in either one of those games will likely lead to a loss. 

8. Virginia

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Record: 9-0

Previous rank: 11

The big concern with Virginia coming into this season was how the team would replace the shooting and scoring of Joe Harris.

Well, that was easy.

The 'Hoos have simply been able to plug and play a better version of Harris in last year's super sixth man, Justin Anderson.

Anderson has been one of the best guards in the country to date, averaging 15.8 points, 4.9 rebounds and 1.7 assists per game. Remember, Virginia plays a snail's pace, so those are some pretty darn good numbers considering the pace.

Anderson has also been an ace from three-point range, shooting a ridiculous 58.8 percent from deep. He's already made 20 threes after making only 30 all of last year. He's averaging 2.2 treys per game—Harris averaged 1.9.

7. Villanova

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Record: 8-0

Previous rank: 7

It's a good time to remind everyone that Villanova was a No. 2 seed in the NCAA tournament last year, lost to the eventual national champion and returned four of five starters. And the man who went from the bench into a starting role this season, Dylan Ennis, is now leading the team in scoring.

The Wildcats are a very experienced, very unselfish bunch that should once again be on one of the top lines come tournament time. They have seven players averaging better than 7.6 points per game, and any one of those seven is capable of leading the team in scoring on any given night.

Combine that with Jay Wright's trapping defenses, and the Wildcats are a scouting report nightmare.

6. Louisville

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Record: 7-0

Previous rank: 8

The best defense outside of Lexington this year resides just down the road in Louisville.

Rick Pitino once again has his Cardinals forcing a bunch of turnovers with their press and then somehow managing to keep shooting percentages low.

Starting guards Chris Jones and Terry Rozier have been terrific thus far as agitators, and to illustrate that point, take a look at how the two most recent opposing point guards fared against Louisville's guards. Florida International's Tashawn Desir and Ohio State's Shannon Scott combined for 14 turnovers.

Scott, who entered that game leading the nation in assists, put up a zero in the assist column against the Cards.

5. Gonzaga

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Record: 7-1

Previous rank: 4

No one likes to lose, but the Zags should be feeling pretty good about themselves after taking Arizona to overtime Saturday. Gonzaga looked like the better team for most of regulation.

The Zags are also playing without backup point guard Josh Perkins, out with a broken jaw, and still have Vanderbilt transfer guard Eric McClellan joining the rotation. 

Those additions will be big because senior point guard Kevin Pangos, who played 43 minutes Saturday, looked tired down the stretch. Once Perkins returns, he'll not only be able to spell Pangos, but also allow him to play off the ball when they're in together. 

Don't be surprised if the Zags end up with only one loss entering the NCAA tournament. They're on another level than the rest of the WCC. And no one should be questioning how good they are after the way they played at Arizona.

4. Wisconsin

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Record: 8-1

Previous rank: 2

It was a bad week for the Badgers. Not just the Duke loss, but a 49-38 win over Marquette made the eyeballs hurt.

What the Badgers need to get out of their little minifunk is better production out of Sam Dekker and Nigel Hayes. Dekker has been nursing an ankle injury, but I'm not so sure that it's inhabiting him that much. He seems to be moving fairly well. He's just not playing all that well.

In the last two games, Dekker averaged 3.5 points on 30 percent shooting, and Hayes averaged 4.5 points on 23 percent shooting.

Both guys are built-in mismatches and just too talented to keep playing that way. That's why no one should be worrying about Wisconsin too much. The Badgers still have enough pieces to play with anybody in the country when they are right, and that includes the Blue Devils. 

3. Arizona

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Record: 8-0

Previous rank: 5

Something I didn't mention about why Gonzaga senior point guard Kevin Pangos looked gassed down the stretch and in overtime against Arizona on Saturday: Pangos had to deal with the defense of T.J. McConnell and Rondae Hollis-Jefferson.

The two combined to cause Pangos to play his worst game of the season, scoring eight points on 3-of-10 shooting with four turnovers.

McConnell put his guys on his back in overtime, scoring all six points for the Wildcats after regulation. But the game might not have gotten there if McConnell had not stripped Pangos when he got into the lane in the final minute of regulation. That was the play of the game.

I've compared McConnell's defense to Aaron Craft in the past. That steal was very Craftesque, and I'm getting to the point where I'm convinced that McConnell is the better defender.

2. Duke

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Record: 8-0

Previous rank: 3

The Blue Devils are putting up silly shooting numbers and barely turning the ball over, which is how you make a really good Wisconsin defense look helpless.

Duke is making 40 percent of its threes and 62.1 percent of its twos, and that kind of accuracy is unprecedented. Now there is likely to be some regression to the mean, but it's at least fun to point out that if the Blue Devils could somehow maintain these shooting numbers, they would be in a club all by themselves.

Thanks to Ken Pomeroy's site, which makes it really easy to track such things, no teams dating back to 2002 (the kenpom era) have shot better than 40 percent from deep and 60 percent inside the arc.

The team that came closest was the 2007 national champs. Florida made 40.9 percent of its threes and 58.7 percent of its twos. The difference between the two offenses is that the Gators turned it over at a much higher clip. 

1. Kentucky

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Record: 9-0

Previous rank: 1

If you think any talk that Kentucky's defense could be one of the best ever is outlandish, well, the numbers so far suggest that kind of discussion to be worthy.

Granted, it has only been nine games, but to put UK's dominance in perspective, let's compare this group to where the 2012 national champs, led by swat artist Anthony Davis, were to date.

Through eight games, those Wildcats, who had also played two top-tier teams (Kansas and North Carolina), held opponents to 79.6 points per 100 possessions.

These Wildcats are holding opponents to 68.2 points per 100 possessions. They're also outscoring opponents at an absurd 47.1 points per 100 possessions, compared to the 2012 team's 35.4 efficiency margin at this point.

If the Wildcats make it through the next three Saturdays (UNC at home, UCLA in Chicago and at Louisville) unscathed, go ahead and bank on the undefeated talk cranking way up. It'll be justified. 

C.J. Moore covers college basketball for Bleacher Report. You can follow him on Twitter @CJMooreBR.