Duke basketball stock on rise, Tar Heels in trouble
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Duke basketball went 2-0 last week, picking up its first win over a ranked opponent by beating the still-No. 25 Ohio State Buckeyes at home on Wednesday night before tallying its first ACC victory by defeating the unranked Boston College Eagles in Durham on Saturday.
And the AP Top 25 voters rewarded the Blue Devils (8-2, 1-0 ACC) for their wins — by a combined margin of 25 points — which came after a loss to the now-No. 4 Purdue Boilermakers in the Phil Knight Legacy title game a week earlier. Duke jumped from No. 17 to No. 15.
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As for Duke's archrival, the UNC Tar Heels (5-4, 0-1 ACC), who began the season at No. 1 in the AP Top 25 and remained there until last week, have now lost four straight. That includes losses on the road in the past week to the now-No. 14 Indiana Hoosiers and the still-unranked Virginia Tech Hokies by a combined 20 points.
UNC fell from No. 18 to unranked this week.
Meanwhile, the Blue Devils are one of only two ACC teams in the latest AP Top 25. The other is the Virginia Cavaliers (7-0, 1-0 ACC) at No. 3, trailing the No. 1 Houston Cougars and No. 2 Texas Longhorns.
Duke's next outing is against the unranked Iowa Hawkeyes (6-1, 0-0 Big Ten) at 9:30 p.m. ET Tuesday as part of the Jimmy V Classic in Madison Square Garden. The Hawkeyes sit atop the "others receiving votes" group.
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