Mississippi State women’s hoops might have started the season on the low end of the top 10, but they’re slowly making they’re way back to the top.
For the second-consecutive week, the Bulldogs moved up a spot in the Associated Press poll. After jumping into the top five last week following Oregon’s loss to Michigan State, a Baylor defeat to the hands of Stanford gave State the No. 4 spot this week.
It’s the 81st week in a row that MSU has been ranked in the AP top 25 and they’ve held a spot in the top 10 for 45-straight weeks.
Ahead of State in the polls is No. 1 Connecticut, No. 2 Notre Dame and No. 3 Louisville. The top four now represents last season’s Final Four teams that met in Columbus, Ohio. UConn received all 31 first-place votes in this week’s poll.
Of note, the Southeastern Conference has five teams in the top 25 this week. No. 9 Tennessee, No. 18 Kentucky, No. 23 Texas A&M and No. 25 South Carolina. Missouri and Georgia are receiving votes. MSU also has three non-conference opponents in the poll led by its Tuesday opponent Oregon at No. 7, No. 12 Texas and No.19 Marquette.
The Bulldogs (10-0) are rounding out the non-conference schedule in a big way as they are on a West Coast swing that begins with No. 7 Oregon (8-1) on Tuesday night and is followed up by Washington (7-4) on Thursday. Both games are set for 9 p.m. CT. with the Oregon contest on ESPN 2.
MSU heads into these ball games as one of the top scoring teams in the country at 92.3 points per game and have outscored opponents by 42 points a contest. All-American senior center Teaira McCowan leads the way with 18.6 points a game and 12.8 rebounds a contest while blocking 2.8 shots
Fellow senior Anriel Howard is averaging 14.7 points and 8.6 rebounds at the power forward spot while they also get 11.8 points from Chloe Bibby and 11.4 from Jordan Danberry.
