The college football season is just starting to wind down, which means college basketball is just getting started. And while the Sun Devils prepare to compete in their first ever Big 12 title game for football, the men's basketball team is garnering attention of their own.
On Monday, the first ever NET rankings were released. For those unfamiliar, NET (NCAA Evaluation Tool) is the replacement for RPI, a metric used to evaluate teams and, ultimately, sort which teams make the NCAA Tournament come March.
NET, which is in its seventh season in use, takes into account a wide variety of factors including winning percentage, opponent's winning percentage, game locations, net offensive and defensive efficiency, and others.
The first NET Rankings of the 2024-25 season are now LIVE.
— Jon Rothstein (@JonRothstein) December 2, 2024
TOP 10:
1. Tennessee
2. Auburn
3. Gonzaga
4. Duke
5. Pitt
6. Florida
7. Marquette
8. Kentucky
9. Kansas
10. Illinoishttps://t.co/FXgMTaeM2M
The first NET rankings of the 2024-25 season have Arizona State (7-1) slotting in at No. 33. That's a very high mark thart reflects the hot start these Sun Devils have gotten off to in Bobby Hurley's 10th season as the head coach.
Playing their first year in the Big 12, widely recognized as the most stacked basketball conference, Arizona State is facing tough competition this year. That said, there are just six conference foes that are ahead of the Sun Devils in this first iteration of the rankings: No. 9 Kansas, No. 11 Cincinnati, No. 19 Iowa State, No. 20 Houston, No. 22 Baylor, and No. 29 West Virginia.
Only two other Big 12 schools made the top 50 in these NET rankings behind Arizona State. Texas Tech came in at 36th and BYU sits at 48th. Oklahoma State an TCU failed to make the top 100, ranking 112th and 121st, respectively.
Something that will put a huge smile on Sun Devil fans' faces, especially after the dominant performance of their football team on Saturday, is the fact that the Arizona Wildcats are sitting in a distant 65th in these rankings. That's a harsh wake-up call for a blue blood program that's stumbled out to a 3-4 start this year.
The Sun Devils' next game will come tomorrow night night at 8:00 PM local Arizona time. They'll host the San Diego Toreros (3-4) at Desert Financial Arena in Tempe.