Illinois Loyalty Top 25 Poll

January 10, 2005 11:34 PM

Today is a very special day at Illinois Loyalty. Not only are we celebrating James Augustine's selection for Big Ten Player of the Week, but we are formally rolling out the inaugural Illinois Loyalty Top 25 Poll. The IL25 is voted on by a select group of members from the Illinois Loyalty Forums. You will find that it is quite unique among the drab world of cookie-cutter college polls. Sure, you'll find the "usual suspects" at the top, but in no other major poll will you find five ties and six teams within the top 5.

IL25 Poll administration, audit, and commentary by IlliniNYC.

IL25 Poll: Jan 10
Rank	Team	Points
1.	Illinois (4)	100
2.	Kansas	94
2.	North Carolina	94
4.	Wake Forest	88
5.	Duke	80
5.	Syracuse	80
7.	Oklahoma St.	79
8.	Georgia Tech	73
9.	Texas	61
10.	Connecticut	56
11.	Kentucky	54
11.	Michigan St.	54
13.	Mississippi St.	48
14.	Gonzaga	46
15.	Boston College	45
15.	Washington	45
17.	Arizona	37
18.	Cincinnati	32
19.	George Washington	27
20.	Louisville	22
20.	Pittsburg	22
22.	Alabama	13
23.	West Virginia	12
24.	Marquette	9
25.	Wisconsin	8

(First place votes in parenthesis. Also receiving votes: Iowa 7, Maryland 6, Oklahoma 5, Arkansas 3.)

After what must have been a week of sleepless nights filled with anticipation, Illinois Loyalty is proud to introduce the inaugural Illinois Loyalty Top 25 (the "IL25") poll. We all know that polls and rankings of any sort are completely irrelevant, particularly if:

Illinois is not ranked first
The poll includes the abbreviation "RPI" or any other similar derivative
Dick Vitale is a contributor
The sample set is not formed from a group of people such as those frequenting websites such as www.IllinoisLoyalty.com, www.illiniboard.com, www.orangeandbluenews.com or www.pleasedontfiremikedavis, unlessyoureplacehimwithstevealford.com.

With the first full week of major conference play behind us, we are proud to unveil the IL25 poll, which reflects the most certainly unbiased opinions of posters on Illinois Loyalty.

In the first poll, Illinois is the unanimous selection for the top spot (unanimity, I suppose, is not much of a feat given number of voters this week). Kansas and North Carolina tied for second with Wake Forest third. I suppose it is an inaugural-week special, but the IL25 includes six teams in the top five, with Duke and Syracuse tied for the fifth spot. With that said, I think we all know that Syracuse would easily win that match-up, even if certain unnamed players were on the court, rather than at home sick on the couch waiting for mommy to bring steak cut in really small pieces...

The Big East leads the conference race with five ranked teams. The ACC is the most impressive, though, with four ranked teams, of which three are in the top five and four in the top eight. The Big Ten, Big Twelve, SEC and Conference USA each have three ranked teams. Amazingly enough, the Pac-10 actually managed to keep two teams ranked in the top 20, despite plenty of evidence that, as a whole, the conference has no business near any top 25 lists.

Two noteworthy teams:

Iowa is noteworthy for really just one reason: the "major" polls last week placed the Hawkeyes anywhere from 14 to 23. Steve Alford's crack coaching and his players clutch performances and inability to embody any qualities typically found in a "team" earned two embarrassing losses that really seemed to set back the average Hawkeye fan's belief that "this is the year," "Iowa will win the Big Ten" and "Illinois is guaranteed at least two losses."
Kansas, though they share it with North Carolina, somehow managed to show up in the second spot. Sure winning at Kentucky any time is good win and sure KU is missing arguably the top player in the country, but yesterday's performance against a top ten team that actually deserves such a ranking would result in a double digit loss. Kansas, without Simien on the inside, embodies the out-of-control, run-for-the-sake-of-running offense that is all too common in today's game. Kansas played an undisciplined game that took advantage of a grossly overrated Kentucky team (reflection of its youth more than anything). For the record, the author of this piece ranks Kansas and Kentucky 3 and 15. But the Kansas ranking assumes Simien is back with the team and ignores the fact that loss number one would have occurred on January 1st, except for a horrendous call at the end of regulation against Georgia Tech...).

Illinois Loyalty Forum members are authorized to vote in the IL25 Poll. Ballots are due no later than 12:00pm (noon) CST on Monday.

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