College basketball power rankings: Gonzaga’s résumé, early dominance vault Mark Few’s team to No. 1

There’s a new No. 1 in our latest college basketball Power Rankings. It’s not Kansas — the preseason and current No. 1 in the AP Top 25 that has looked fallible at times. And it isn’t Auburn, the No. 1 team in these Power Rankings last week that is dominating both sides of the floor. Nor is it, as you might’ve guessed as a well-versed hoops fan, the Houston Cougars, the No. 1 team on BartTorvik’s analytics-driven site despite losing to the aforementioned Auburn Tigers.

It’s the Gonzaga Bulldogs. And it’s a deserved recognition for a team that has looked like the best team in college basketball this season.

Gonzaga opened the season with a shocking result in Spokane: a 101-63 blitzing of then-No. 8 Baylor. But the shock wore off a bit after a close tilt at home vs. Arizona State, followed by a drubbing of UMass Lowell that didn’t air on linear cable.

But the Bulldogs reminded the college hoops ecosystem this week why they should be considered the best in basketball right now by taking it to San Diego State on the road in an 80-67 win on Monday and then doubling up Long Beach State, 84-41, on Wednesday night. Their résumé is now as follows: 

• Wins by 38 and 13 over Baylor and San Diego State, respectively
• No. 1 offense in adjusted efficiency margin at KenPom
• No. 18 defense in adjusted efficiency margin at KenPom
• No. 3 in fewest turnovers per game, committing 8.0 per game
• No. 7 in 3-point percentage allowed; opponents shooting 22.5% from 3-point range vs. Gonzaga

If you want to rank Kansas at No. 1 after it opened the season at No. 1 and has yet to lose, fine. If you want to rank Auburn or Houston or UConn at No. 1 because the eye test or analytics or some combination of both, I wouldn’t put up a huge fight. But the Zags are No. 1 given their performances in a handful of quality nonconference games and their electric offense, which looks like it’ll be among the toughest to slow in the sport.

Your thoughts, Mr. Few?

The Week 2 Power Rankings — of which there are 16 teams — are listed below. As I intend to do each way to make it crystal clear, my own personal operating guidelines for how I rank the teams are also listed below. I promise to abide by these as closely as I can throughout the season. 

Power Rankings definition: Ranking teams with an emphasis on recent performance based on their level of competition. These are heavily unscientific in nature and can be distilled down to a “vibes” ranking — with things like margin of victory, injuries, performance vs. top competition, momentum and other sometimes subjective factors weighing into the equation. The power rankings can be thought of in a weekly setting as a reaction — or sometimes even an overreaction — to the small sample of the week that was. 

Let’s get to it.