Cowgirl Basketball Continues to Rise in AP Poll

Oklahoma State has had an impressive start to the year and is only climbing higher.

Over the first couple of weeks of the season, OSU women’s basketball has been one of the most impressive teams in the entire country. The Cowgirls have started the season with five dominant wins, beating their opponents by at least 50 points in four of those contests.

Already coming into the year with high expectations, there were some doubts about how the Cowgirls would handle that pressure, especially in the early stages of the year. As it turns out, things have gone quite well for the Cowgirls.

While every matchup thus far has been in Gallagher-Iba Arena, they will be heading to New York for their first road matchup of the year against St. John’s. Perhaps most importantly, they will be heading into that matchup as the No. 18 team in the country.

In the latest AP poll on Monday, the Cowgirls landed as the 18th-best team in the nation, a slight rise from the No. 20 spot they held last week and the No. 22 spot they held in the preseason. The Cowgirls are the fourth-highest ranked of five Big 12 squads, coming in behind No. 7 Baylor, No. 10 TCU and No. 12 Iowa State while maintaining their spot ahead of No. 23 West Virginia.

OSU’s upcoming matchup at St. John’s will be the first of two true road games in the nonconference slate for the Cowgirls, with an early September matchup at North Texas also looming. As the Cowgirls look to navigate their nonconference slate, they will also have three neutral-site battles, most notably a Bedlam matchup in Oklahoma City against No. 8 Oklahoma.

As Jacie Hoyt’s team looks to make it back to the NCAA Tournament and make some noise in 2026, it has an opportunity to enter Big 12 play as one of the top teams in the country. If it can continue to secure dominant wins against unranked opponents and show up against some of its premier competition ahead of conference play, OSU might enter its Big 12 opener as a conference favorite rather than just a dark horse.

While it won’t necessarily be easy to keep up this type of dominance, even against inferior competition, the Cowgirls have already set themselves up for success for the rest of the season. As one of the nation’s best teams already, OSU is ready to continue building on one of the best teams in program history.