The NCAA college basketball rankings were released, and the California Golden Bears and Stanford Cardinal were shut-out completely of the rankings. It's not a huge surprise though. Cal was shut down by now 11th ranked San Diego St. Aztecs 77-57, then lost in the final seconds to a feisty Southern Mississippi Golden Eagles squad; they fall to 5-4 on the season as they try to slug through their brutal non-conference slate (currently the 4th toughest in the nation). Stanford only played one game this past week, and they were hardly impressive in their victory over UC Riverside, winning only by a final of 55-48.
In the rest of the Pac-10, only three teams picked up any votes. The Huskies fell out of the top 25 from 21st into the 28th spot after playing sloppy basketball in College Station, losing 63-62 to the Texas A&M Aggies. The Aggies ended up taking Washington's spot, as Washington was the only team to fall out of the top 25. Arizona didn't help their case after getting demolished by the 16th ranked BYU Cougars in Salt Lake City; they received only eight votes this week. Coming on strong are the Washington St. Cougars, who finished in 36th place after their demolition of Gonzaga. The Cougars are starting to look like a strong underdog candidate to compete for the conference crown this season, picking up five votes.
Only one Bay Area school received votes: the 7-2 St. Mary's Gaels, led by head coach Randy Bennett. Their two losses have come to Mountain West Conference world beaters, including those same Aztecs and Cougars. They received six votes to finish in 35th. St. Mary's doesn't play a good team for another month, so they'll have to keep on winning to get into the polls.
Don't expect many changes next week. There are no marquee matchups for these teams, other than Arizona going to the East Coast to take on North Carolina State. Stanford does play at Butler, but the Bulldogs are struggling too, so even a Cardinal victory wouldn't really do much for them to get into the top 25.