College basketball rankings

Two polls, both votes. The AP Top 25 is voted by sportswriters and broadcasters; the Coaches Poll is voted by active head coaches. They usually agree at the top and part company from about 15 down, which is the interesting half — a coach sees fewer games than a writer does and tends to move teams more slowly.

The number beside a team in the top 25 is its first-place votes, and the number in the tail is total poll points. Both are worth more than the rank on its own: a team ranked 2nd with 40 first-place votes is in a different position from one ranked 2nd with none, and the rank alone can't tell you which.

Ranks tie, and we don't hide it. When two teams finish level on points the poll lists both at the same number and skips the next one — the 2025-26 Coaches Poll put two teams at 13 and went straight to 15, and one week published 26 ranked teams on a tie for 25th. A page that trimmed to 25 would have dropped a ranked team.

A poll is not a projection. It carries memory: a preseason number 3 slides a few spots at a time even after a bad month, because that's how voters move. A model has no loyalty — it re-rates every team off what happened. We don't publish a projected margin for college basketball yet, and won't until it's been fitted and walked forward on college results; the engine behind the other sports was measured on the NBA, and transplanting those constants is the mistake that priced a college football favourite 18 points off the market. Until then this page is the poll, reported accurately.

Looking for a specific program? All 365 are listed by conference, and the night's games are on the scoreboard.