Winners and Losers from the AP College Basketball Top 25 Rankings in Week 11

The release of the Week 11 Associated Press Top 25 means that we are now officially more than halfway through the 2014-15 college basketball season without Kentucky even remotely wavering from its spot at No. 1.

The Wildcats from Lexington have now received at least 95 percent of the first-place votes in nine consecutive weeks. They are currently the only SEC team in the Top 25 after Arkansas' miserable week sent the Razorbacks spiraling out of the poll.

Kentucky isn't the only team with that nickname being held in high regard, though. Both the Villanova Wildcats and Arizona Wildcats remain on the prowl this week, climbing to No. 4 and No. 7, respectively.

Elsewhere, Duke lost by double digits to an unranked team for the second week in a row, but the Blue Devils only dropped one spot thanks to the bounce-back win over Louisville on Saturday.

And good luck picking a favorite in the Big 12. The nation's best conference currently has six teams ranked between No. 9 and No. 21 and a seventh ranked first among others receiving votes.

Read on for the rest of this week's biggest winners and losers from the AP poll.

Winner: State of Iowa

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There are four Division-I college basketball programs in the state of Iowa, and they all had a fine week.

Ames is home to the Iowa State Cyclones. They have been the breadwinner for the Hawkeye State all season long, and that didn't change this week.

They suffered a heartbreaking loss to Baylor on Wednesday night after fighting back from a 22-5 deficit to take the lead multiple times in the final two minutes. But they made up for it with a home win over Kansas on Saturday night. The road to the Big 12 title goes through the Jayhawks, and the Cyclones took a nice step in that direction with the head-to-head victory.

Despite the midweek loss, Iowa State jumped two spots to No. 9.

Northern Iowa plays its home games in Cedar Falls, and the Panthers have now won five straight since opening Missouri Valley play with a loss to Evansville. Wins over Bradley and Missouri State were nothing special, but they were able to climb three spots to No. 20 this week, regardless.

In Iowa City, the Hawkeyes finally made their season debut in the AP Top 25 at No. 25 this week after a road win over Minnesota—improving to 3-0 in true road games on the year—and a home win over Ohio State that completed a season sweep of the Buckeyes.

They better not rest on their laurels, though. Two of their next three games are against Wisconsin, with a road game against Purdue sandwiched in between.

Last, and absolutely least, the Drake Bulldogs from Des Moines even won their first MVC game of the season by putting an end to any misguided hopes that Indiana State had of going undefeated in conference. The Bulldogs didn't make the Top 25 (their current record is a lowly 4-14), but they still had an impressive week.

Not a bad basketball week for a state that has been represented in the Final Four exactly once since 1969.

Loser: Arkansas Razorbacks

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Seven days ago, Arkansas was one of our biggest winners. The Razorbacks got us to buy in with a road win over Georgia and a convincing home win over Vanderbilt.

They were flying so high that we even started considering Bobby Portis' Player of the Year stock, saying, "It will be hard to deny him a spot in the top 10 next week if the Razorbacks can take care of business against Tennessee and Ole Miss before then."

Oh dear.

Before playing Arkansas, Tennessee scored 38 points against Alabama. After playing Arkansas, Tennessee scored 59 points against Missouri—it was the first time the Tigers held a team to fewer than 60 points since November 16.

Naturally, the Volunteers scored 74 in upsetting Arkansas on Tuesday.

In case anyone didn't catch that first game, the Razorbacks really drove the point home by giving up 96 points to Ole Miss on Saturday. Playing at home where they had been practically invincible for the past two-and-a-half seasons, the Razorbacks allowed the Rebels to score 1.39 points per possession, according to KenPom.com.

Let's not mince words—it was an atrocious week. In a span of two games, Arkansas went from being the team that might beat Kentucky to being a team that might not make the NCAA tournament.

The Razorbacks dropped out of the Top 25 from the No. 19 spot, making them the biggest loser of the week.

Winner: Dayton Flyers

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Looks like we were a bit ahead of the curve in awarding Dayton the final spot in our top 25 last week. The AP voters caught up by putting the Flyers at No. 22 this week—their first appearance in the poll this season and their highest AP ranking since November 2009.

If the season ended today, you'd have a hard time convincing us that Archie Miller isn't one of the leading candidates to be named the 2014-15 AP Coach of the Year.

Before the season even began, the Flyers lost four of their six leading scorers from last season—three graduated and Khari Price decided to transfer to Southern Miss. Dayton isn't a tiny school, but it certainly doesn't have the recruiting power of in-state schools like Ohio State or Cincinnati. Replacing that production wasn't going to be easy.

Then in late December, Devon Scott and Jalen Robinson—the only scholarship players taller than 6'6"—were dismissed from the team. Scott led the team in rebounds and shooting 63.6 percent from the field. Robinson wasn't anywhere near that efficient, but he still logged 15.3 minutes per game.

They weren't small losses by any means.

As Gary Parrish noted in his piece on Dayton for CBSSports.com, Dayton's starting frontcourt is now the same height as Kentucky's starting backcourt.

You'd think the Flyers would be losing games left and right, but they have won eight straight since losing their big men—and have even won the rebounding battle in five of those games.

Loser: Big 12

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Is it possible the Big 12 has too much of a good thing?

Here's what each previously ranked team in the conference did this past week and how it affected their AP stock.

Iowa State: Lost at Baylor. Won vs. Kansas. Jumped two spots to No. 9.

Kansas: Won vs. Oklahoma State. Lost at Iowa State. Dropped two spots to No. 11.

West Virginia: Blowout win vs. Oklahoma. Blowout loss at Texas. Dropped two spots to No. 18.

Oklahoma: Blowout loss at West Virginia. Win vs. Oklahoma State. Dropped one spot to No. 19.

Texas: Blowout win vs. West Virginia. Jumped three spots to No. 17.

Baylor: Won vs. Iowa State. Lost at Kansas State. Jumped one spot to No. 21.

Oklahoma State: Lost at Kansas. Lost at Oklahoma. Dropped out of Top 25 from No. 24.

In summation, those six teams went 6-7 almost entirely against one another and had a net drop of one spot in the AP Top 25. It's very much a zero-sum game.

There are currently six Big 12 teams with an extremely strong case for a tournament bid, one team (Oklahoma State) which is definitely on the right side of the bubble at the moment, two teams (Kansas State and TCU) which are one quality win from being on the right side of the bubble and Texas Tech as the league's doormat.

If they just keep beating each other up for the next two months, the Big 12 could very legitimately have six to eight teams in the AP Top 25 until further notice. But for every team that emerges as a Final Four contender, at least one other team inevitably needs to drop out of the picture.

We'll see if anyone volunteers for either of those jobs in the near future, but the Big 12's case for best conference in the country is losing a bit of steam without a clear candidate for the national championship.

Winner: Arizona Wildcats

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It was a very weird week for AP Top 25 teams, as highlighted by the Big 12 moments ago.

With the exception of Texas—the Longhorns only played one game this past week—Arizona was the only ranked team to pick up a marquee win without also losing a game.

Duke scored a huge road win over Louisville, but the Blue Devils dropped one spot because they were also blown out at home by Miami. West Virginia destroyed Oklahoma before getting destroyed by Texas. Oklahoma responded to that blowout by blowing out Oklahoma State.

And so on, and so forth.

But Arizona comfortably took care of business against both Utah and Colorado this week to earn back some AP voter love after last Sunday night's disturbing loss to Oregon State.

Stanley Johnson was a monster this week, tallying 40 points, 17 rebounds, four assists and four steals. Most importantly of all, he committed a total of two fouls and two turnovers in his team's two wins by double digits.

That's hardly a coincidence. In our Freshman of the Year rankings from Wednesday, we noted how important it is to Arizona's success for Johnson to be able to play 30 minutes without getting into foul trouble or giving away possessions.

An efficient Johnson makes Arizona a championship-caliber team.

The AP agrees. The Wildcats jumped three spots to No. 7.

Loser: Wyoming Cowboys

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Congratulations on your first appearance in the AP poll in more than a quarter of a century, but don't let the door hit you on the way out.

Wyoming just barely made it into the AP Top 25 last week. Not only were the Cowboys ranked No. 25, but they received 71 votes while Ohio State got 70 and Michigan State got 67. Quite literally, one slight change of opinion by any voter and they wouldn't have had that number next to their name for seven days.

Unfortunately, the Cowboys lost a home game to San Diego State by a score of 60-52 before scoring 70 points in a triple-overtime win over Fresno State.

#WyomingHoops

Because of the loss and ugly win, the Cowboys dropped out of the AP Top 25 but did still receive four votes. It's not a stretch to think Wyoming could be ranked again next Monday with wins this week against New Mexico and Utah State.

Whether that's a vote of confidence in the Cowboys or a statement about the lack of worthy teams around the country is for you to decide.

Winner: Notre Dame Fighting Irish

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In most weeks, there's a pretty clear-cut line between the legitimate candidates to win the national championship and the teams that are pretty good with question marks.

This week, that line was drawn after the No. 7 spot. Arizona was disrespected on a few ballots, but for the most part, it was Kentucky at No. 1, Virginia at No. 2 and then Gonzaga, Villanova, Duke, Wisconsin and Arizona in some order.

Even though the Fighting Irish trailed by 12 points against both Georgia Tech and Miami this week, Notre Dame is currently being regarded as the best of the rest, jumping four spots to No. 8 for those come-from-behind victories without a full rotation.

Zach Auguste had been one of Notre Dame's most valuable players before he was suspended due to academics. The suspension only lasted one game—he missed the Georgia Tech game and played just nine minutes against Miami—but it was very impressive to see the Fighting Irish claw back for a pair of wins without the full services of their only noteworthy big man.

Loser: Louisville Cardinals

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In our apparent quest as a nation to diagnose what's wrong with every national title contender, our focus has shifted from Kentucky to Duke to a Louisville team that has now lost to both of those blue bloods.

The Cardinals shoot 29.4 percent from three-point range as a team. It isn't the worst percentage in the nation, but it does rank 319th out of 351. And Duke certainly wasn't the first team to dare Louisville to hope and pray that its long-range shots would start falling.

Cleveland State is a very small team, but the Vikings packed the lane and were able to hold the Cardinals to 45 points, as Louisville shot 3-of-20 from beyond the arc back in November. Similarly, Clemson focused its efforts on taking away Montrezl Harrell, as Louisville shot just 6-of-24 from three-point range and scored 58 points less than two weeks ago.

Fortunately, Louisville has one of the best defenses in the country and was able to win those games anyway, but the wins merely delayed the realization that this team simply can't shoot and has only one true interior player who can be relied on for points.

To be fair, though, it wouldn't be the first time Louisville succeeded despite this Achilles' heel. As a team, the Cardinals shot 33.3 percent from downtown in the year that they won the 2013 national title.

But that's more than twice as good as the 16.0 percent they shot on Saturday that left a horrible taste in the mouths of AP voters. The Cardinals fell four spots to No. 10.

Winner: San Diego State Aztecs

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Both on Twitter and on the CBS Sports Network, Seth Davis officially dubbed Saturday as "National Don't Make Baskets Day."

Really, though, teams have been celebrating that day all season long. According to StatSheet.com, field goals made per game (by both teams combined) has reached a new low of 47.16. That's the lowest rate since at least the 1996-97 season. It was 48.78 last season.

National free-throw percentage (68.53) is also lower than it has been since the 2000-01 season.

Basically, kids can't put the ball in the hoop anymore, and San Diego State nearly reappearing in the AP Top 25 is evidence that scoring is overrated.

According to KenPom.com, the Aztecs rank second in the nation in adjusted defensive efficiency—trailing only Kentucky in that department. However, they are ranked 232nd in adjusted offensive efficiency—slightly better than UNC-Asheville and slightly worse than Eastern Illinois.

Yet it's hard to deny that they deserve to be ranked after winning three consecutive games against New Mexico, Wyoming and UNLV.

The Wyoming game was the big one. Not only were the Cowboys ranked No. 25 last week, but it was a road game against a team that is typically pretty dominant at home. It was the first time since wins over Utah and BYU in the first two weeks of the season that San Diego State really looked like a team that could defend its way at least into the second weekend of the NCAA tournament.

The Aztecs have another major hurdle this week when they travel to Colorado State on Saturday. If they win that game and the road game against Air Force on Tuesday, the Mountain West title will be theirs to lose.

Loser: Big East

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It was a nice week for Villanova. The Wildcats moved up one spot to No. 4 after a strong 13-point win over Xavier and a less comfortable 15-point win over Penn.

However, they are oh-so-close to being the only Big East team in the AP Top 25.

The Big 12 has a monopoly on the spots in the teens, but the Big East has evidently decided to set up shop in the mid 20s and high 30s.

With Seton Hall losing to Butler and dropping to No. 24 this week, the Pirates join Georgetown (No. 29), Providence (No. 32) and Butler (No. 36) on the list of Big East teams doing just enough to get noticed but not enough to be loved.

Really, they have DePaul to thank for that.

While Texas Tech is playing nice and barely even challenging its Big 12 overlords, DePaul came into conference play on a six-game losing streak before deciding to win four of its first six games.

Because both Xavier and St. John's lost to DePaul, the entire conference looks weaker as a result. Seton Hall and Georgetown both lost to Xavier. Providence lost to St. John's. How can those three teams expect to get or stay in the Top 25 while losing to teams who lost to DePaul?

Parity has been pretty kind to the Big Ten and Big 12, but it has been cruel to the Big East thus far.

Kerry Miller covers college basketball for Bleacher Report. You can follow him on Twitter @kerrancejames.