K-State Still On Top in Big 12 Women’s Basketball Power Rankings
The Big 12 women’s basketball season is now 11 weeks old and after seven games of league play the movement continues in our power rankings.
We’ll stick with four tiers in the power rankings. As it relates to these rankings, we are treating TCU’s losses as forfeits, just as the Big 12 will for standings purposes.
Below we present our 11th Big 12 women’s basketball power rankings for the 2023-24 season and after three Big 12 games.
Tier One
1. Kansas State (18-1, 7-0) – Last Week — 1
If you’re the only remaining undefeated team in league play, you get a tier to yourself. But Ayoka Lee’s injury means the Wildcats will have to lean on their experience playing without her last year. So far, so good. The Wildcats beat Kansas on Saturday. Now, it’s off to Baylor on Monday, which will be a much tougher test. K-State has a little room to operate — but not much. Watch Zyanna Walker’s play during this time. She’s coming off the bench and has given K-State a huge lift.
Tier Two
2. Texas (18-2, 5-2) – Last Week — 3
3. Iowa State (12-5, 6-1) – Last Week — 2
4. Oklahoma (11-6, 5-1) – Last Week — 5
5. Baylor (15-2, 4-2) – Last Week — 4
6. West Virginia (16-2, 5-2) – Last Week — 6
Iowa State lost its only game last week but picked up a win from the TCU forfeit. It wasn’t easy to determine where to slot the Cyclone. The loss to Texas Tech — which is on a different tier — compelled me to drop the Cyclones a couple of spots, but in front of Baylor and Oklahoma. Texas keeps responding without Rori Harmon. Oklahoma keeps rolling with Skylar Vann and faces Texas this week. West Virginia looks like the team that could — COULD — sneak into one of the Top 4 seeds in Kansas City.
Tier Three
7. Oklahoma State (11-7, 4-3) – Last Week — 7
8. Texas Tech (14-6, 3-4) – Last Week — 10
9. BYU (12-8, 2-5) – Last Week — 12
10. Kansas (9-9, 2-5) – Last Week — 8
11. Houston (11-7, 2-5) – Last Week — 9
This is the tier where you could put these five teams in any order and I’m sure there would be much to complain about. Everyone here suffered at least one loss during the week and there seems to be clear separation between this group and the second tier. BYU moved up a tier with its win last week. This is the group that is good enough to do some damage but may not be good enough to dance in March.
Tier Four
12. TCU (14-4, 1-6) – Last Week — 11
13. Cincinnati (9-8, 1-5) – Last Week — 13
14. UCF (9-7, 0-6) – Last Week — 14
I don’t know what TCU team we’re going to get later this week. The Horned Frogs’ first game back should be interesting (a lot of folks will be counting roster spots). The Bearcats suffered the same fate against WVU as Houston did, as the Bearcats were shut out in the first quarter. But the Bearcats have a win this season and UCF does not, so the Knights stay in the last spot.
You can find Matthew Postins on Twitter @PostinsPostcard.
