The Associated Press released the preseason college basketball poll on Monday, and to little surprise the number one team in the preseason poll is Kansas. The Jayhawks received 37 first place votes. Following KU, is Kentucky who has 19 first place votes. Gonzaga, Duke, and Virginia round out the top five.
Although the Florida Gators don’t crack the AP Top-25 poll, they did receive 71 votes from the press, giving them the 29th most points in the poll. Essentially this places the Gators behind several SEC programs.
Five SEC teams are ranked inside the top 25, Kentucky (2), Tennessee (6), Auburn (11), Mississippi State (18), and LSU (23), followed by UF (29), Alabama (35) receiving votes. Missouri (50) finished with a single in the AP Poll.
Note, the poll was voted on and submitted in the middle of last week before the news of Missouri star Jontay Porter broke, about suffering an ACL injury that’ll force him to miss the season.
The entire Top 25 poll is listed below.
1. Kansas – 1,581
2. Kentucky – 1,529
3. Gonzaga – 1,461
4. Duke – 1,452
5. Virginia – 1,286
6. Tennessee – 1,268
7. Nevada – 1,230
8. North Carolina – 1,221
9. Villanova – 1,085
10. Michigan State – 1,024
11. Auburn – 974
12. Kansas State – 922
13. West Virginia – 678
14. Oregon – 638
15. Virginia Tech – 630
16. Syracuse – 620
17. Florida State – 530
18. Mississippi State – 451
19. Michigan – 437
20. TCU – 311
21. UCLA – 297
22. Clemson – 268
23. LSU – 187
24. Purdue – 170
25. Washington – 165
Others receiving votes: Loyola (Chi) 162, Marquette 124, Indiana 98, Florida 71, Nebraska 35, Maryland 28, Wisconsin 24, Notre Dame 22, Cincinnati 21, Alabama 15, UCF 15, Buffalo 14, Arizona 14, Louisville 11, Miami 10, San Diego St 9, USC 6, Butler 6, Texas Tech 6, Texas 5, Arizona St 3, St. John’s 3, Providence 2, Xavier 2, Missouri 1, NC State 1, Marshall 1, Davidson 1