It happens every Monday at noon. You’re probably refreshing a Twitter feed or checking a sports app, waiting for a group of sixty-some-odd journalists to tell you who the best teams in the country are. The college basketball AP poll is a weird tradition when you actually think about it. We live in an era of advanced analytics, KenPom ratings, and NET rankings that use complex algorithms to determine team quality, yet we still obsess over a subjective list compiled by human beings who might have missed half the games on the West Coast because they were sleeping.
It’s messy. It’s biased. And honestly? It’s exactly what makes the sport great.
If you’ve ever screamed at your phone because your team stayed at #12 while some "blue blood" jumped three spots after beating a cupcake, you’re part of the ecosystem. The AP Top 25 isn’t just a list; it’s the primary narrative engine for the entire regular season. Without it, November and December games would feel like a series of disconnected exhibitions. With it, every upset becomes a seismic event that reshapes the national landscape.
The Human Element in a Data-Driven World
Why do we still care about the college basketball AP poll when we have the NET? The NCAA’s own Evaluation Tool (NET) is what the selection committee actually uses to build the bracket in March. It’s objective. It doesn’t care about the name on the jersey. But humans do.
The AP voters—vetted sportswriters from across the nation—bring something to the table that a computer simply can’t: "The Eye Test." A computer might see a 2-point win over a sub-300 ranked team and penalize a powerhouse for lack of efficiency. A human voter sees that the star point guard was out with the flu and that the team traveled through a blizzard to get to the arena.
There’s a nuance there.
Voters like Bob Holt from the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette or Seth Davis often talk about the "burden of proof." Early in the season, the poll is basically a projection based on recruiting rankings and returning starters. By January, it shifts. It becomes about "What have you done for me lately?" This creates a fascinating tension between teams with high "ceilings" and teams with high "floors." You’ll often see a three-loss blue blood like Duke or Kansas ranked ahead of an undefeated mid-major simply because the voters believe the talent level will eventually win out. Is that fair? Maybe not. But it’s how the sport is discussed at the water cooler.
How the Voting Actually Works
It’s not some secret society in a basement. The process is surprisingly transparent, though it often feels chaotic. Each voter submits their own Top 25. A first-place vote is worth 25 points, a second-place vote is 24, and so on, all the way down to a single point for 25th place.
The math is simple, but the psychology is complex.
Some voters are "poll extremists." They’ll drop a team ten spots for a single road loss. Others are "sticky." They hate moving teams unless they absolutely have to. This internal friction is why you’ll sometimes see a team with a massive gap between their highest and lowest individual votes. In 2024, we saw instances where a team was ranked as high as 5th by one voter and completely unranked by another in the same week. That kind of variance is exactly why the aggregate matters—it smooths out the regional biases.
The "Poll Inertia" Myth and Reality
You’ve probably heard the term "poll inertia." It’s the idea that once a team is ranked high, they stay there unless they lose. It’s a real phenomenon, and it’s arguably the biggest flaw in the college basketball AP poll.
If North Carolina starts the season at #2 and wins five games against mediocre mid-majors, they likely stay at #2. Meanwhile, an unranked team like Iowa State could beat two Top 20 opponents in a tournament and only rise to #18. The "starting line" matters way too much.
But here’s the thing: poll inertia is also what creates the "Big Game" feel. When #1 plays #2, it’s a national event. If the poll was purely based on weekly performance, the rankings would be too volatile to build a season-long story. We need that stability to create "villains" and "underdogs."
The Mid-Major Struggle
Life isn't fair for the Gonzagas and San Diego States of the world—or at least it wasn't until recently. For decades, the college basketball AP poll was notoriously dismissive of anyone outside the power conferences. To get into the Top 10, a mid-major usually had to go undefeated well into January.
That’s changing, mostly because voters are getting smarter. They’re looking at KenPom. They’re looking at strength of schedule. They realize that winning by 30 points in the Mountain West is often more impressive than scraping by in the ACC. Still, the "brand name" bias exists. If a team like Kentucky is hovering around the "Others Receiving Votes" section, they’ll almost always get the benefit of the doubt over a 15-1 Drake or Florida Atlantic.
Tracking the Movement: What to Look For
If you want to understand where the poll is going, don't just look at the wins and losses. Look at the spread.
When the gap between the #1 and #2 team is only 10 or 20 points, it means the voters are divided. We saw this during the 2023-2024 season with UConn and Houston. Both teams were monsters, but they played entirely different styles. UConn was an offensive juggernaut; Houston was a defensive meat-grinder. The college basketball AP poll reflected a philosophical divide among the writers.
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- Monday Mornings: This is when the chaos is quantified.
- The "Others Receiving Votes": This is the most important part of the list for hardcore fans. It’s the waiting room. If your team is here, they’re one big win away from the spotlight.
- The Drop: Watch how far a team falls after an "upset." If a #5 team loses on the road to a #10 team and only drops to #7, the voters still believe in them. If they drop to #15, the honeymoon is over.
Why the AP Poll Matters for the NCAA Tournament
Technically, the college basketball AP poll has zero impact on the NCAA Tournament selection. The committee is legally (well, by-law) required to ignore it.
Except they don’t. Not really.
The committee members are humans. They read the news. They watch the same games. When the AP poll builds a narrative that a certain conference is "down" this year, that narrative seeps into the room. If the Top 25 is loaded with Big 12 teams all season, the committee is much more likely to give a 9-loss Big 12 team an at-large bid over a 4-loss team from the Pac-12 (RIP) or the Atlantic 10.
The poll creates the "vibe" of the season. It determines which games get the "Prime Time" treatment on ESPN. It determines which players get National Player of the Year buzz. If you aren't in the Top 25, you're basically invisible to the casual fan until March.
Common Misconceptions
People think the AP poll is a "power ranking." It isn't.
A power ranking asks: "Who would win on a neutral court tomorrow?"
The AP poll asks: "What have you earned based on your resume?"
This is why you’ll often see a team like Arizona ranked lower than a team they actually beat. If Arizona lost two other games to unranked scrubs, the voters punish the "body of work," even if the head-to-head suggests they are the better team. It’s a reward system, not a gambling line.
How to Use the Poll to Your Advantage
If you’re a fan, use the poll as a roadmap. Don't take it as gospel. Honestly, the best way to enjoy it is to find the one voter who has your team ranked way too low and complain about them on Reddit. It’s a rite of passage.
For bettors, the college basketball AP poll can actually be a trap. The "ranked vs. unranked" matchup is a classic spot where the public overvalues the number next to a team's name. Often, an unranked home favorite is actually the better team according to the Vegas sharps, but the casual money flows toward the "Top 25" team.
Actionable Steps for Following the Rankings
If you want to be the smartest person in your bracket pool or at the bar, stop looking at the poll in a vacuum. Compare the college basketball AP poll to the KenPom.com rankings every Monday.
Look for the "discrepancy teams."
If a team is #8 in the AP poll but #25 in KenPom, they are likely overvalued and due for a collapse. They’ve probably won a lot of close games they should have lost.
Conversely, if a team is #20 in the AP but #5 in KenPom, buy stock immediately. The writers haven't caught on to how good they actually are because they might have a few "quality losses." These are the teams that make Final Four runs as 5-seeds.
Also, follow the individual ballots. Sites like College Poll Tracker show exactly how every single writer voted. You’ll quickly learn which writers are biased toward their local teams and which ones actually put in the work to watch the late-night Mountain West games.
The poll isn't a perfect science. It’s a weekly snapshot of a chaotic, beautiful sport. Use it to find the storylines, but use your own eyes to find the champions. Check the next update on Monday, see who climbed the ladder, and then go look at the efficiency margins to see if they actually deserved it. That's where the real insight lives.