All-Time AP Poll, 2024 Update
Another year of ranking movement, featuring a rare post-tournament poll!
It’s that time again!
Briefly: in 2021, I tabulated an all-time men’s college basketball program ranking I call the All-Time AP Poll (which now resides on my new personal website!). Allow me to copy/paste the same intro text I always use to explain how it works:
The actual AP Men’s Basketball Poll is calculated on a weekly basis by taking individual voters’ ballots, assigning each ranked team a point value inverse to their ranking (#1 gets 25 points, #2 gets 24 points, down to 1 point for #25), and combining all of the ballots to calculate each team’s final score. My All-Time AP Poll performs the same calculations, but instead of combining 60 or so individual voters’ ballots to determine the best teams on any given week, I combine all 1280 composite weekly polls—from January 18, 1949, to the present day—to help determine the best programs of all time.
This is probably the best college basketball idea I’ve ever had. In fact, it’s such a good idea that, this January, the Associated Press themselves stole my entire flow and declined to credit me even after I asked.
But they’re not updating their version on a weekly basis and—ever since I originally released it—I have been!
Last year, I wrote a recap to detail the full-season movement on the All-Time AP Poll, and if it’s all the same to y’all, I’m gonna make that a yearly event.
This was a super busy year on the poll, with lots of movement among historically great programs, tons of shuffling in the middle, and two programs—James Madison and South Florida—becoming ranked for the first time and bringing the total number of All-Time AP Poll entrants to a robust 207.
Without further ado!
Biggest Point Gainers
A total of 52 different teams were ranked on the AP Poll at some point during the 2023-24 season. Of those, 12 gained at least 250 points: the equivalent of being ranked #1 for ten weeks.
These were the biggest point gainers of the year.
The maximum amount of points any one team could have earned this year was 525: 25 points * 21 polls. Of those 525, Purdue missed just 24, giving them 95.4% of possible points on the season. This is pretty much in line with last season, when Houston earned 95.6% of possible points (454/475).
Speaking of Houston, despite marginally worse performance, they earned more points this year than they did last year because there were two more polls released; the season was one week longer and the AP also released a post-tournament poll for the first time since 1975.
Rounding out the top five, and joining Purdue and Houston as the only teams to be ranked #1 this season, are UConn, Kansas, and Arizona. The latter two peaked early—Kansas the preseason #1 and Arizona taking the throne for two weeks in December—before faltering and ending the season outside the top 10. UConn, of course, peaked at the right time, hitting #1 for the first time in January, staying there for most of the second half, and winning the national championship.
Tennessee and Baylor—along with Purdue, Houston, Kansas, and Arizona—find themselves in this rarified air for the second consecutive season.
Additionally, three blue bloods and two Big East rivals continued to rack up the points.
How many of these point gains resulted in movement in the ranking? Let’s see who rose the most this year.
Highest Rank Climbers
Eight teams climbed at least five spots on the All-Time AP Poll in 2023-24.
As you’d expect, most of these teams are lower in the ranking, where more teams with similar point values reside to be passed en masse by anyone who gains momentum for a few weeks.
Like last year, Florida Atlantic rode this momentum to a huge leap. After being ranked for their first five weeks in program history to finish 2022-23, Florida Atlantic began this season in the top 10 and rose as high as #7 before falling out of the poll after 15 weeks. That boosted them 46 spots, all the way to #137.
Speaking of new All-Time AP Poll members, after defeating Michigan State in East Lansing to open the season, James Madison joined the rankings for the first time ever in Week 2 and remained ranked for eight weeks, rising as high as #18. This rocketed them ahead of 37 teams—a bigger jump than Florida Atlantic made following their debut last year (22 spots).
About midway up the rankings, three western teams continued their climbs: Colorado State, ranked for nine non-consecutive weeks, saw the biggest jump, but Utah State was ranked for an even longer ten weeks, and Saint Mary’s recovered to rise exactly five spots for the second year in a row after essentially vomiting all over the court several times in the non-conference slate.
We’ve even got some big movement in the top 100, as Creighton put together their best season since the days of Doug McDermott, while Houston and Iowa State battled atop the new-look Big 12 all year.
What goes up must come down, so naturally, some teams fell multiple spots in the All-Time AP Poll over the course of the season. Let’s check out this years unfortunate souls.
Losing Ground
Last year, I highlighted every team that dropped at least two spots on the All-Time AP Poll. This year, there were 51 of those, which is almost a quarter of the entire ranking. Florida Atlantic, Colorado State, and James Madison rising so much—at around the same spot in the ranking—led to numerous teams getting passed up by exactly two of them.
Rather than call out every single one of those teams, many of whom have not been ranked for decades and some of whom no longer play Division I basketball, I’ll focus on the three teams that dropped three spots.
It’s impressive that Holy Cross is still in the top 100 considering they haven’t been ranked since 1978. This year they were passed up by San Diego State, who settled in 84th, and by Miami (FL) and Texas Tech, who ended the season tied for 85th.
Meanwhile, TCU and Colorado—despite each briefly being ranked this season—both fell behind Washington State, Saint Mary’s, and Utah State, who were ranked varying levels of higher and longer. Tough.
Those were all the big moves on the All-Time AP Poll this season. But, like last year, I’ll send us off by mentioning everyone whose standing changed at least a little this season.
And the Rest
The following teams, sorted by current All-Time AP Poll rank descending, are listed differently on the poll today than they were a year ago. This means they either gained at least one point or were passed up in the rankings by at least one team.
Kentucky (+274 points)
North Carolina (+361)
Duke (+310)
Kansas (+415)
Arizona (+411) [+1 rank]
Louisville [-1]
Michigan State (+35)
Illinois (+241) [+1]
Ohio State [-1]
Villanova (+17)
UConn (+483) [+1]
Maryland [-1]
Purdue (+501) [+1]
Marquette (+381) [+1]
Georgetown [-2]
Gonzaga (+162) [+2]
Oklahoma (+118) [+2]
Virginia (+15) [-2]
Notre Dame [-2]
NC State (+16)
Tennessee (+401) [+1]
Iowa [-1]
Alabama (+113)
Florida (+4)
Memphis (+57)
Arkansas (+30)
Texas (+76) [+1]
Missouri [-1]
Houston (+472) [+6]
Oklahoma State [-1]
Pitt [-1]
Wake Forest [-1]
West Virginia [-1]
Kansas State [-1]
Wisconsin (+99) [-1]
Baylor (+270) [+3]
Minnesota [-1]
Stanford [-1]
LSU [-1]
Auburn (+160) [+4]
USC (+18) [-1]
San Francisco [-1]
Bradley [-1]
Wichita State [-1]
Iowa State (+164) [+5]
Providence (+4) [-1]
Xavier [-1]
Florida State [-1]
Temple [-1]
Washington [-1]
South Carolina (+71)
Mississippi State (+1)
New Mexico (+9)
BYU (+115) [+2]
Western Kentucky [-1]
Saint Louis [-1]
Dayton (+58)
Creighton (+254) [+7]
Clemson (+58) [+1]
Arizona State [-2]
St. Bonaventure [-2]
Texas A&M (+55)
UMass [-2]
Butler [-1]
Davidson [-1]
San Diego State (+73) [+2]
Miami (FL) (+74) [+3] and Texas Tech (+29)
Holy Cross [-3]
Saint Joseph’s [-1]
Nevada (+3)
Utah State (+63) [+8]
Georgia [-1]
Saint Mary’s (+52) [+5]
Columbia [-2]
Washington State (+28)
TCU (+8) [-3]
Colorado (+9) [-3]
Louisiana-Lafayette [-2]
Wyoming [-2]
Indiana State (+3)
Ole Miss (+11) [+1]
Rutgers [-1]
Northwestern (+1)
Florida Atlantic (+141) [+46]
Southern Miss [-1]
CCNY [-1]
Northern Iowa [-1]
Colorado State (+77) [+21]
Southern Illinois and ETSU [-2 each]
Oral Roberts [-2]
Buffalo and Hamline [-2 each]
Hawai’i and Canisius [-2 each]
Centenary [-2]
Charlotte [-2]
Siena [-2]
Rhode Island [-2]
Charleston [-2]
Illinois State [-2]
Loyola Marymount [-2]
Rice [-2]
Air Force [-2]
New Orleans and South Alabama [-2 each]
Richmond and Western Michigan [-2 each]
Manhattan [-2]
Weber State [-2]
Ball State [-1]
St. Francis Brooklyn [-1]
Idaho State [-1]
Eastern Kentucky [-1]
Miami (OH) [-1]
James Madison (+43) [+37 / NEW]
Yale [-2]
UTRGV [-2]
Pacific [-2]
Dartmouth [-2]
Cornell [-2]
Chattanooga [-2]
Portland [-2]
Beloit and San José State [-2 each]
UCF and West Texas A&M [-2 each]
Wofford, Austin Peay, VMI, and West Virginia Tech [-2 each]
Northern Illinois [-1]
North Texas and Army [-1 each]
Harvard [-1]
Eastern Michigan [-1]
Green Bay, Iona, Lamar, and Northeastern [-1 each]
Cleveland State, Furman, Maryland Eastern Shore, Missouri State, Pepperdine, Texas State, Wayne State (MI), and Winthrop [-1 each]
Boise State and Middle Tennessee [-1 each]
Middle Tennessee [-1] and South Florida (+3) [+2 / NEW]
Bucknell [-2]
Old Dominion [-2]
This concludes another season of tracking the All-Time AP Poll—which, again, was my idea, not the AP’s.
I know I’m ranting at this point, but I was legitimately upset for a week after some friends first notified me of my work being lifted. It’s equal parts reassuring and demoralizing; I take pride in knowing that my work was interesting enough to be stolen (and expanded upon) by the Associated Press themselves, but it hurt real bad that they apparently thought so little of the work’s original creator that they erased my name from it and ignored me when I brought it to their attention.
Nevertheless, this remains my project, and I appreciate everyone who continues to enjoy it, find value in it, share it, and support it. Truly, I consider the All-Time AP Poll a triumph, and given the vast amounts of historic college basketball research I’ve done in the past few years, I hope to have even bigger projects coming sooner or later.
As for this one, I’ll see you again at this time next year to run it back down!
Also, FSU losing 1 place :(
Anyone want to go picket the AP with me?