Wake Forest Athletics
Deacons Ranked No. 1 in Both Basketball Polls
1/19/2009 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Jan. 19, 2009
Wake Forest on Monday moved into the number one spot in both major college basketball polls. The Deacons, 16-0, are the top-ranked team in the country according to the Associated Press and the ESPN/USA Today Coaches poll.
Wake Forest, the only unbeaten team in Division I, received 769 points and 25 of 31 first place votes in the USA Today/ESPN poll. Duke is second with 747 points and six first place votes. In the AP poll, the Deacs garnered 68 of 72 first place votes and received 1,793 points to Duke's 1,721.
It marks the first time since 2004-05 that Wake Forest has been ranked No. 1. The Deacons spent two weeks in the top spot on Nov. 22 and Nov. 29, 2004. Wake Forest was No. 2 in the AP preseason poll that year behind Kansas and moved to No. 1 after the Jayhawks posted a narrow 68-61 win over Vermont on Nov. 19.
The Deacons opened the 2004-05 season with wins over George Washington and VCU before moving to No. 1. Wake then defeated Yale in the Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum and went to New York's Madison Square Garden where it defeated Providence and No. 18 Arizona to win the Preseason NIT. Wake suffered a 91-73 loss at Illinois on Dec. 1 in the ACC-Big 10 Challenge that dropped the Deacons to No. 6 in the Dec. 7 AP poll.
The Deacons have spent the first 10 weeks of the season in the Top 25, starting with a preseason ranking of No. 21 (AP) and No. 24 (USA Today). Wake Forest has steadily climbed in the rankings, reaching No. 2 in the Jan. 12 AP poll and No. 3 in the USA Today poll.
"I think being No. 1 on January 19 is far, far from the most important thing," said Wake Forest head coach Dino Gaudio. "I think we've come a long way. We have a long, long way to go. We have tremendous room for improvement. We gave up 21 second (chance) shots on Saturday (at Clemson), we had 19 turnovers. The two games prior to that, we did not shoot well from the free throw line.
"I told the guys on the bus (after the Clemson game) that if they're happy on January 19 that we're number one in the country, then they're not the team that I think they are."
All-time, the Deacons have been ranked in 261 prior national basketball polls and have spent 98 weeks in the top 10.
At 16-0, Wake Forest is off to its best start in school history. The 1926-27 team had started off 15-0 before losing its first game.
This marks the third time this season that a Wake Forest team has been ranked No. 1 in the nation. The men's soccer team spent the entire regular season ranked No. 1 while the Deacon field hockey team was No. 1 for two weeks in the fall.
Wake Forest will host Virginia Tech on Wednesday, Jan. 21 at the Joel Coliseum. The Deacons will then be idle for six days until a home contest with Duke on Wednesday, Jan. 28 at the Joel.
