1. Xavier (16-3, 6-0 Atlantic 10): The scary proposition for opponents in the Atlantic 10 or down the road in the NCAA tournament is Xavier has climbed into the top 10 nationally while its best player is still climbing back toward full form after missing last season with a knee injury. Amber Harris had 19 points, 14 rebounds and four assists Saturday against Dayton, but Musketeers coach Kevin McGuff isn't ready to say the 6-foot-5 star is all the way back.
"She's not. She knows it; I know it," McGuff said Saturday. "But today was certainly a step in the right direction. She had great energy to start the game, and when she plays like that, it certainly adds another dimension to our team."
2. Gonzaga (18-4, 7-0 West Coast Conference): The team that beat Xavier, sans Harris, in the first round of last season's NCAA tournament keeps rolling through the West Coast Conference. A 24-point win at Loyola Marymount on Jan. 23 is the closest thing to a squeaker the Bulldogs have played since a strong second-half rally fell short against Texas A&M before Christmas. They've won their last nine games by an average of 36.2 points. The nation's leader in assists per game, Courtney Vandersloot, is shooting 47.8 percent from the 3-point line through seven WCC games, reversing an early-season funk from long range.
3. Green Bay (18-2, 7-2 Horizon): Texas dropped from No. 1 to No. 6 in the men's Top 25 after dropping a pair of games in the span of a week, but I'm not ready to drop quite as severe a hammer on the Phoenix after a disastrous two-loss weekend in Chicago a week ago. The losses at Illinois-Chicago and Loyola were damaging, although probably not fatal to Green Bay's NCAA tournament at-large profile. The Phoenix are an excellent offensive team, but as they're 42.1 percent field goal defense and narrow rebounding margin suggest, defense becomes a potential weak spot if opponents don't turn over the ball.
4. Hartford (18-3, 9-0 America East): Style points aside, there's something working when you can hit 15 field goals, turn over the ball 18 times and come away with a win at Vermont, a place no other team but Nebraska has successfully visited this season. Hartford is not a good offensive team by any conventional measure. But the Hawks do have some players, particularly Diana Delva and Erica Beverly, who they can turn to for big buckets. And when you play defense like this team does (35.6 percent field goal defense), that goes a long way.
5. Princeton (15-2, 3-0 Ivy League): There's nothing a good team can do about its schedule once it hits conference play, but it does have control over whether it plays down to the level of competition or keeps gliding on its own trajectory. The Ivy League is a low-major league, but the Tigers are treating it like a mid-major team should. The Tigers won their first three conference games by at least 21 points and have held seven of their last nine opponents to fewer than 50 points. Their field goal differential (they are shooting 45.2 percent, while opponents are shooting 34 percent) is off the charts.
6. TCU (15-5, 5-2 Mountain West): The Texas A&M win in December (along with wins against Kansas and Fresno State) keeps coming through as an unofficial tiebreaker for TCU in sorting out the logjam atop the Mountain West, but another road loss at a tough league venue puts it in some peril. Two and a half weeks after losing at Wyoming, TCU dropped a 60-53 decision at New Mexico on Saturday. Helena Sverrisdottir is shooting just 38.2 percent overall and 25 percent from the 3-point line through seven conference games, compared to 47.3 percent overall and 41 percent from the 3-point line in 13 other games.
7. Drexel (14-6, 8-1 Colonial Athletic Association): Not long before the CAA season, Drexel coach Denise Dillon joked that as deep and talented as the conference looked this season, she was glad her team "got" while the getting was good in winning the conference title and automatic NCAA tournament bid last season. Well, deep league or not, the Dragons don't appear ready to give up the crown. They aren't doing it easily, already playing three overtime games and three other games decided by three or fewer points in conference play. But they are doing it. Trips to James Madison and VCU in the next two weeks will test them.
8. Fresno State (17-5, 8-0 WAC): The Bulldogs came through the first of two gauntlets in the WAC unscathed, winning at Nevada and at home against Louisiana Tech and Boise State in the span of seven days (those three opponents are a combined 13-5 in their other conference games). Junior Jaleesa Ross just keeps getting better, even after earning all-conference honors a season ago. She's averaging 17.5 points per game on a career-best 47 percent shooting from the floor (she's also shooting 40.9 percent from the 3-point line).
9. Dayton (16-5, 4-2 Atlantic 10): Plotting Dayton's last four games on a graph would offer a picture closer to the horizon of the Himalayas than the familiar flatness of its Ohio home. Lose at A-10 afterthought St. Joseph's, beat Richmond by 52 points and Duquesne by 22 points in Pittsburgh and lose by 25 points at Xavier. Sophomore Justine Raterman was key in the Duquesne win with 17 points, seven rebounds, three assists, two blocks and a steal. Able to shoot from outside and maintain a presence in the post, even against the likes of Xavier's front line, she's a player best appreciated in person.
10. Marist (17-5, 9-1 MAAC): The Red Foxes had hit a rough patch even before losing 69-59 at Niagara on Sunday to fall into a first-place tie with Iona in advance of hosting the Gaels on Friday night. The lull isn't the sole product of shooting poorly, but it's not a coincidence three relatively close calls and Sunday's loss came during a stretch in which Marist shot 10-of-52 from the 3-point line. With MAAC teams intent after four seasons on making someone other than Rachele Fitz beat them, the team's shooters have to make them pay for the tactic.
Next five: Vermont, Middle Tennessee State, VCU, Toledo, Illinois State
