FAYETTEVILLE – Arkansas basketball will enter the final week of the regular season boasting its highest ranking in The Associated Press Top 25 poll in more than 20 years.
The Razorbacks, who won nine consecutive SEC games, moved up eight places to 12th in the AP poll released on Monday. It is the highest ranking of the program in the survey since it ranked 12th in February 1998.
It is the third biggest leap of a week for Arkansas in the AP basketball survey, according to HogStats.com, and the biggest since the Razorbacks jumped from unclassified to 12th place in December 1992, after a 3-game start -0 that included two wins the first 10 teams.
Razorbacks (19-5, 11-4 SEC) were ranked in three consecutive AP polls for the first time since the end of the 2014-15 regular season.
Arkansas scored 2-0 last week with home wins over then-null Alabama 6 on Wednesday and LSU on Saturday. The Razorbacks are scheduled to play in South Carolina (6-12, 4-10) on Tuesday and host Texas A&M (8-7, 2-6) in a rescheduled home final on Saturday.
“We are playing very well,” said Arkansas coach Eric Musselman on Saturday. “As I mentioned and told the team, when we have an exciting game like the one we played against Alabama, there is a concern about the next game. The same thing now.
“We had a great week, we won two very, very big games and now it’s a question of how to turn the page and prepare for South Carolina as quickly as possible.
The Razorbacks holds second place in the SEC, two games ahead of Florida.
Crimson Tide Number 8 is the only other SEC team in this week’s AP poll. Alabama won its first SEC regular season title since 2002 on Saturday.
This week’s top 25 AP
1 Gonzaga (24-0)
2 Michigan (18-1)
3 Baylor (18-1)
4 Illinois (18-6)
5 Iowa (18-7)
6 West Virginia (17-6)
7 Ohio State (18-7)
8 Alabama (19-6)
9 Houston (20-3)
10 Villanova (15-4)
11 State of Florida (14-4)
12 Arkansas (19-5)
13 Kansas (18-8)
14 Creighton (17-6)
15 Texas (14-7)
16 Oklahoma (14-7)
17 State of Oklahoma (16-6)
18 Texas Tech (15-8)
19 San Diego State (19-4)
20 Loyola Chicago (21-4)
21 Virginia (15-6)
22 Virginia Tech (15-5)
23 Purdue (16-8)
24 Colorado (19-7)
25 Wisconsin (16-9)