Women’s college basketball rankings: Duke and TCU rise big in latest poll, Notre Dame falls

December 2, 2024

While one of the most exciting weeks of the nonconference season and one of the most frustrating weeks to find games on multiple obscure streaming platforms, the holiday week provided plenty of interesting games and results.

That included one ACC team dealing with everyone, while the other team came off a strong start in Week 3 and took a big dip in Week 4. These are all part of the changes in the rankings after Week 4 in college basketball.

Associated Press Women's College Basketball Rankings Top 25 after Week 4:

University of California Los Angeles
university university
south carolina
texas
LSU
University of Southern California
maryland
duke
TCU
notre dame cathedral
oklahoma
ohio
Kansas
kentucky
west virginia
north carolina
iowa
Ole Miss
Alabama
iowa
illinois
Louisville
michigan
michigan
nebraska

Other people to vote for: north carolina 58, Georgia Tech 33, Stanford 28, Tennessee 16, Oregon 15, Florida St. 14, Richmond 13, Mississippi St. 11, Vanderbilt 8, Baylor 6, Utah 5, Harvard 4, South Dakota St. 4, Creighton 3, Minnesota 3.

Duke Blue Devils break top 10

On November 10th, duke blue devils Lost in a close away game against a player ranked 18th at the time. maryland terrapin. After suffering a blowout loss to Ohio State in the NCAA Tournament eight months ago, Duke started the season 0-1 against top-ranked opponents.

After two weeks of defeating unranked opponents, including a mid-major tournament team in the South Dakota State Jackrabbits, the No. 11 Blue Devils experienced a tough test before heading to Nevada for the Ball Dawgs Classic.

Head coach Carla Lawson's team defeated the No. 9 Kansas State Wildcats and No. 8 Kansas State Wildcats to pass. oklahoma sooners.

The Wildcats were outscored 14-4 against Kansas State, but the Blue Devils didn't trail for long. Spearheading the comeback was a career day for Ashron Jackson, who started the second quarter with 16 points. Combine this with Duke only allowing the Wildcats four field goals, and the Blue Devils built a lead they would never relinquish.

Jackson scored 30 points in the 73-62 victory, helping the Blue Devils reach the 30-point mark for the first time since 2019.

Ragan Richardson was in the spotlight against the Sooners as the opening act on Monday and the main event on Wednesday.

Similar to Monday's win, the Blue Devils started late but made an early comeback. Duke held the lead for most of the game, holding a 15-point lead in the second half, but Peyton Verhulst erased that lead. In that time, the guard scored three of his team-leading 29 points, sending the game into overtime.

Richardson and Duke responded in a big way as the Blue Devils star scored 10 of his 35 points in a 109-99 victory. Richardson's performance earned him the tournament MVP trophy within a week and returned Duke to the top 10 for the first time since the 2022-23 season.

In Week 5, they'll take on the South Carolina Shumcocks for the SEC-ACC Challenge, but life won't be that easy. Duke has lost its fourth straight game to the Gamecocks, led by Dawn Staley.

Horned frogs make history

Things didn't go as planned in the second half for No. 17 TCU women's basketball against No. 3 Notre Dame on Friday. The Fighting Irish held a 14-point lead with 13 minutes left and looked poised to add another number to the win column after starting the season undefeated.

Horned frogs were not phased.

TCU led by eight points and outscored Notre Dame 31-12 in the fourth quarter for a program-record-tying victory over the third-place team. This is the highest winning record ever by a Big 12 team.

Leading the way was transfer guard Haley Van Lith, who scored 19 of her 21 points in the second half, nine of which came in the final 10 minutes. Van Lith's stellar scoring performance also included seven assists as the final season of his career continues.

After playing a modest role with the LSU Tigers last season, Van Lith averaged career-highs in his first season at TCU, averaging 19.9 points and 7.1 assists per game. That's a far cry from his previous season high of 3.6 assists with the Tigers.

Fellow transfer graduate Sedona Prince also became the first player in NCAA history to record at least 20 points, 20 rebounds, and eight blocks against the nation's top five teams.

That was one reason why the Irish struggled to get shots in the final quarter. Notre Dame made 5 of 20 from the floor and missed all three attempts from beyond the arc in the fourth quarter as the Horned Frogs cruised to a 76-86 victory.

The win against Notre Dame, followed by Saturday's win over the USF Bulls, moves the Horned Frogs to No. 9 in this week's rankings.

TCU's ranking is the highest in program history, surpassing its 13th place ranking in February 2004.

Notre Dame stumbles

The Fighting Irish were on a roll following their Nov. 23 trip to Los Angeles, defeating the No. 1 team in the world at the time. The USC Trojans were ranked No. 3 but took a big drop in Week 4. After TCU's comeback, things got even worse.

Notre Dame ended its time in the Cayman Islands with a loss to the unranked Utah Utes. Despite leading by five points at halftime, Utah went on a 15-0 run from before halftime to after halftime.

The Utes outscored the Irish 46-30 in the second half and won 78-67.

In the loss, the star backcourt duo of Hannah Hidalgo and Olivia Miles struggled to hit their stride offensively. The two made 8 of 24 field goals, and Miles scored a season-low eight points. It was just the second game of Hidalgo's career without an assist, and the first of the season.

Head coach Neale Ivey's team hasn't lost two games in a row since February 2021, when the Irish lost conference games to Louisville and Clemson to end the 20-21 season.

The path from here to Notre Dame Cathedral is not so easy. There will be no nonconference games against mid-majors to shake off the rust of two debilitating losses. Thursday, the Irish welcome texas longhorns Off to South Bend for the SEC-ACC Challenge. One week later, they welcome the UConn Huskies to end a grueling matchup in which four of their six opponents are ranked in the top 25.