Gonzaga debuts as top five team in college basketball NET rankings

The Gonzaga Bulldogs finished the month of November with a clunker against Michigan in the Players Era championship, suffering a 40-point loss on Wednesday in Las Vegas - the worst of Mark Few's career.

However, the rest of the month was littered with quality wins, both at home and on the road, and ultimately resulted in the Zags debuting at No. 5 in the NET rankings, which were released on Monday.

Gonzaga comes in behind Michigan, Duke, Purdue, and Vanderbilt, with Arizona, Iowa State, UConn, Louisville, and Michigan State rounding out the top ten.

The NET rankings, released by the NCAA, separate a team's games into four distinct quads based on where the game was played and the quality of the opponent. The breakdown is as follows:

Quadrant 1: Home 1-30, Neutral 1-50, Away 1-75
Quadrant 2: Home 31-75, Neutral 51-100, Away 76-135
Quadrant 3: Home 76-160, Neutral 101-200, Away 135-240
Quadrant 4: Home 161-353, Neutral 201-353, Away 241-353

Gonzaga is currently 1-1 in Quad 1 games (win over Alabama, loss to Michigan), 1-0 in Quad 2 games (Arizona State), 3-0 in Quad 3 games (Oklahoma, Creighton, Maryland) and 2-0 in Quad 4 games (Texas Southern, Southern Utah).

The Zags will hope that improvement from those Q3 power conference teams will elevate them to Quad 2 status, which seems likely as those programs continue to gel and face strong competition in conference play.

Gonzaga has five non-conference games remaining, although only one of them is currently a Quad 1 opportunity. That would be this Friday's game in Nashville against the Kentucky Wildcats, who are currently No. 15 in the NET with a 5-2 record: 0-2 in Quad 1 games, and 5-0 in Quad 4.

The UCLA Bruins (No. 76) are a Quad 2 opportunity for Gonzaga right now, although a top 50 finish for Mick Cronin's team seems quite likely, which would result in this game being Quad 1.

It's less certain the Oregon game will reach Quad 1 status, as the Ducks are an abhorrent 192 in the NET as of Monday, with a 4-3 overall record including an 0-1 mark in Q1 games and an ugly 1-2 mark in Q3. They would need to climb all the way to the top 50 for this matchup to be Quad 1, and top 100 for it to even be Q2.

Gonzaga should get a handful of Quad 1 opportunities in conference play, with Saint Mary's (No. 29) currently inside the top 30, while Santa Clara (No. 32) is hovering in that territory as well.

The WCC is tied with the A-10 with three top 50 teams in the NET, only one behind the Big East.

Following Gonzaga (5), Saint Mary's (29), and Santa Clara (32), the rest of the WCC is as follows: Pacific (81), SeattleU (109), San Francisco (121), LMU (143), Portland (223), Washington State (225), Pepperdine (247), Oregon State (265) and San Diego (279).

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