The University of Alabama men’s basketball team went from unranked to being placed well within national top 25 rankings this week, checking in at No. 18 in the Associated Press Poll and No. 16 in the USA Today Coaches Poll released on Monday.
Bama is riding a seven-game winning streak going into Tuesday night’s contest at LSU and owns an overall record of 11-3 this season. The Crimson Tide is in first place in the SEC standings with a perfect 6-0 conference record, including impressive road wins against Tennessee, Auburn and Kentucky.
Most recently, Nate Oats’ team demolished Arkansas on Saturday in Tuscaloosa; the Razorbacks were 10-3 going into what turned out to be a bench-clearing blowout.
This is the first time since December 2017 that Alabama has been ranked in the AP Poll, when they spent two weeks in the top 25 while reaching a high-water mark of No. 24.
It is also the first time since 2007 that the Tide has been ranked in the AP Top 25 in the month of January. The last time an Alabama team was ranked by the AP as high as No. 18 came in 2011.
Tuesday’s matchup in Baton Rouge should be a good one, as LSU (10-2, 5-1 SEC) is also receiving votes to be ranked (No. 33 in the AP Poll) and is currently second in the SEC standings. That contest is slated to tipoff on ESPN2 at 8:00 p.m. CT.
Sean Ross is the editor of Yellowhammer News. You can follow him on Twitter @sean_yhn
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