College basketball rankings: Auburn is 16-2 and has a chance to pick up its first Quadrant 1 win this week.College basketball rankings: Auburn is 16-2 and has a chance to pick up its first Quadrant 1 win this week.

The Tigers, who are up to No. 7 in the CBS Sports Top 25 and 1, play Alabama and Mississippi State this week.

So far this season, 96 schools have at least one Quadrant 1 win. Auburn isn’t one of them, which is one of the reasons Bruce Pearl’s team is widely regarded as the most exciting in the sport. It’s a squad that has constantly risen in computer rankings over an 11-game winning streak, but it lacks the type of game-changing victory that most of its competitors already have.

Pearl, of course, is not unaware of this.

He is well-known for his skepticism.

“[My players] were asking me, ‘Coach, are you impressed yet?” Pearl said after his Tigers beat Ole Miss 82-59 on Saturday, improving to 16-2 overall and 5-0 in the SEC. “I actually haven’t been. Part of it is that we haven’t played many ranked teams, but Ole Miss is ranked, and they’re a solid team that is very well-coached. To play so brilliantly and dominate the game the way we did was astounding.”

The average margin of victory during this 11-game winning streak has been 21.8 points. Auburn has defeated five top-100 NET teams during the period, including No. 39 Texas A&M, No. 70 Ole Miss, No. 90 USC, No. 93 LSU, and No. 100 Indiana.

However, none of these are first-quarter wins.

So the Tigers are 0-2 in the first quarter, but 6-0 in the second, 5-0 in the third, and 5-0 in the fourth

In a world where Kansas, Kentucky, Illinois, Memphis, and FAU have all suffered at least one Q3 loss, Auburn has avoided any problems outside of Q1. That is a positive. But the Q1 column still needs a boost, and one could be on its way.

Auburn has two first-quarter opportunities this week. First, the Tigers will play against Alabama on Wednesday. On Saturday, they will play against Mississippi State. Because Alabama and Mississippi State are both in the top 40 of the NET and road games against the top 75 of the NET are Q1 opportunities, Auburn could be 18-2 overall, 7-0 in the SEC, and have two Q1 wins by next week. For now, the Tigers are No. 7 on Sunday morning’s CBS Sports has updated its Top 25 and No. 1 daily college basketball rankings, with Purdue remaining No. 1 for the 11th straight day. On Saturday, the Boilermakers defeated Iowa 84-70 for their seventh consecutive first-quarter victory.

 

Top 25 And 1 rankings