Indiana Women's Basketball Ranked 25th In AP Top 25 Preseason Poll

Indiana is ranked in the AP preseason poll for the sixth consecutive season.

Indiana Hoosiers guard Chloe Moore-McNeil (22) looks to get the ball past Iowa Hawkeyes guard Sydney Affolter (3) during the second half at Simon Skjodt Assembly Hall. / Marc Lebryk-Imagn Images

BLOOMINGTON, Ind. – Indiana’s women’s basketball team is included in the Associated Press preseason women’s basketball poll for the sixth consecutive season … but only just.

The Associated Press preseason poll was released on Tuesday. Indiana was ranked 25th in the poll, beating rival Iowa by nine points to make it into the Top 25.

Defending national champion South Carolina is the No. 1 team in the poll, receiving 27 out of a possible 30 first-place votes.

Indiana was the sixth-highest rated Big Ten school in the Top 25 as the Big Ten only trailed the Southeastern Conference (eight teams) in poll representation. No. 3 Southern California, No. 5 UCLA, No. 14 Ohio State, No. 18 Maryland and No. 23 Nebraska are the other Big Ten teams in the Top 25. Iowa, Illinois and Michigan State did not make the Top 25, but received at least one vote.

In addition to Big Ten opponents in the poll, the Hoosiers could also play No. 12 Baylor and No. 15 North Carolina in the Battle 4 Atlantis in the Bahamas in November.

In the six-year period where Indiana has been in the preseason Top 25, the previous lowest spot the Hoosiers occupied was the No. 24 spot in 2020. During Teri Moren’s coaching reign, the Hoosiers have been included in the preseason poll on seven occasions. Indiana was not in the preseason Top 25 prior to Moren’s tenure at all.

Indiana returns starters Yarden Garzon, Chloe Moore-McNeil and Sydney Parrish. Help from the transfer portal comes in the form of Penn State transfer guard Shay Ciezki and Tennessee post player Karoline Striplin. Lilly Meister is expected to play regularly after Mackenzie Holmes exhausted her eligibility.

The Hoosiers return nearly all of their bench contributors as Lexus Bargesser, Lenee Beaumont, Juli LaMendola and Henna Sandvik are back for more.

Indiana opens its regular season against Brown on Nov. 4.

Here’s the entire AP Top 25 poll. First-place votes are in paranthesees. The number total is points compiled via voting, not the total of voters. A total of 25 points are awarded for a first-place vote, one point for a 25th place vote with all values in-between:

1. South Carolina (27), 745 poll points.

2. Connecticut (2), 708.

3. USC (1), 697.

4. Texas, 641.

5. UCLA, 628.

6. Notre Dame, 614.

7. LSU, 549.

8. Iowa State, 521.

9. North Carolina State, 510.

10. Oklahoma, 441.

11. Duke, 439.

12. Baylor, 422.

13. Kansas State, 390.

14. Ohio State, 372.

15. North Carolina, 285.

16. West Virginia, 277.

17. Louisville, 250.

18. Maryland, 227.

19. Florida State, 191.

20. Ole Miss, 165.

21. Creighton, 152.

22. Kentucky, 108.

23. Nebraska, 106.

24. Alabama, 67.

25. Indiana, 46.

Receiving votes (numbers reflect point totals received for votes, not the number of votes): Iowa 37, TCU 30, Utah 24, Illinois 23, Stanford 17, Michigan State 16, Gonzaga 16, Vanderbilt 12, South Dakota State 7, Miami (Fla.) 4, Tennessee 3, Fairfield 3, Middle Tennessee State 3, Georgia Tech 2, Syracuse 1, Princeton 1.

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