Decisions, Decisions

By Mel Greenberg

This was one of the more interesting Sunday nights when it came to selecting the top of the newest Associated Press poll, to be announced Monday.

The ballot may come out differently but this was the thinking here in selecting the top ten, which will become moot if Maryland pulls another upset Monday night with a win at Duke.

But for now, I made Duke No. 1 for surviving the week.

Maryland was No. 2, based more on currency than of the entire who-beat-who season because of the win at North Carolina and losses to just the Blue Devils (a rout) and Tennessee (competitive).

North Carolina was dropped to third because it was an overtime loss so I didn't want to give the Tar Heels too much punishment for the setback.

LSU was bumped back a spot at No. 4 because the Tigers survived the week and had the win at Tennessee. I believe this team will probably be all over the upper map because of various interpretations, but with three Top Five teams losing at home, there was an impact in the decision-making process.

Rutgers was jumped to No. 5 because of the quality win at Connecticut. I gave them a jump over Ohio State because on the season, the win at UConn helps place them ahead with a quality triumph. Had Maryland lost and/or LSU lossed, it would have been easy to move the Scarlet Knights up another notch or two.

Ohio State was then moved up a spot to sixth, and Tennessee was dropped to seventh, although it's possible the Vols are capable of coming back and beating the teams above them listed this week on this ballot.

Connecticut was lowered to eight because Tennessee had the head-to-head win, but the drop from No. 4 to No. 8 should be thought more in terms of gymnastics decimal points in separation instead of ranking numbers, because of the lack of a clear frontrunner at the moment.

Then Oklahoma was left at No. 9 and Purdue at No. 10.

Immaculata reunion

Penn State's win at home over Illinois Sunday, for the moment, kept the Nittany Lions from avoiding a losing record, even though the schedule ahead would indicate that may happen for the first time since the cavewoman era in 1973 when Penn State was 3-5.

That was when Penn State coach Rene Portland and Illinois coach Theresa Grentz happened to be teammates at Immaculata, which won a second-straight national title.

Temple shaved again.

Oops. Sorry. For commentary on this one, you'll have to wait until its covered in the weekly Tuesday notebook in the printed edition of The Inquirer that will also be found at Philly.com.

Call of the Orient.

That subheadline above is a way of telling you I have 20 minutes to get over to a late-night restaurant in Chinatown, several blocks from here, to down a bowl of Won-Ton soup on the way home. :)

No matter what the postime time indicates, it's really 3:55 a.m.

We'll be back late Monday night after the Maryland game and to see how we did against the consensus pick of my colleagues.

-- Later

Mel