Stanford’s 17-year run in AP women’s basketball poll ends
Stanford’s 17-year run in the Top 25 is over.
The Cardinal on Monday fell out of the Associated Press women’s basketball poll for the first time since the 2001 season, ending a streak of 312 consecutive ranked weeks.
The remarkable run started with the 2001-02 preseason poll and ended Christmas. Stanford (6-6) lost at home last week to Western Illinois and Tennessee to fall to .500 on the season
Only Connecticut, which remained the unanimous No. 1 team as voted on by a 32-member national media panel, has a longer active streak in the poll. The Huskies have been ranked for 458 consecutive weeks.
Uconn was followed by Notre Dame, Louisville, South Carolina and Mississippi State. Baylor is sixth, and Texas is eighth. Texas A&M is 22nd.
In the men’s rankings, Villanova stayed comfortably at No. 1 in a Top 25 poll that offered little change at the top.
The top four teams stayed the same with the Wildcats (12-0) receiving 43 of 65 first-place votes to stay at No. 1 for the third consecutive week. Michigan State (12-1) was second and had 16 firstplace votes; third-ranked Arizona State (12-0) had six first-place votes to stay ahead of No. 4 Duke (12-1).
TCU moved up to 10th — the Horned Frogs’ highest ranking in the history of the program. Baylor remains No. 18, and Texas Tech dropped a spot to 22nd.
In other college basketball news:
• Bennie Boatwright scored a career-high 33 points, including a long 3-pointer with 4.1 seconds left, to lead Southern California past New Mexico State 77-72 in the title game of the Diamond Head Classic in Honolulu. Boatwright, who also had seven rebounds, was named the tourney’s most valuable player. In the tourney’s third-place game, Dewan Huell scored 21 points, and Bruce Brown Jr. had 20 as No. 15 Miami beat Middle Tennessee 84-81.
Head of Russian group steps aside
Vitaly Mutko, a Russian government official who has been dogged by allegations of involvement in doping, said he temporarily would step down as president of the Russian Football Union.
It is a move apparently intended to deflect international criticism as Russia prepares to host the 2018 World Cup.
Mutko said at a briefing that he would suspend his activities as president for six months and that Alexander Alayev would serve as the acting head of the Russian Football Union.
Mutko would retain the job of deputy prime minister overseeing sports.
Investigations by the World Anti-Doping Agency and the International Olympic Committee alleged Mutko was involved in a sophisticated state-sponsored doping program during the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi. Mutko, who served as Russia’s sports minister during the Games, has denied all doping allegations.
The IOC didn’t accuse Mutko of being personally involved in doping but banned him from the Olympics for life, saying he and his ministry bore overall responsibility for “failure to respect” antidoping rules.