Ohio State atop AP polls again

Associated Press

Ohio State is a unanimous choice as the No. 1 team in The Associated Press Top 25 for a second straight week.

The Buckeyes are 24-0 and the only unbeaten team. They are No. 1 for the fourth consecutive week and received all 65 first-places votes Monday from the national media panel.

They are followed by Kansas, Texas, Pittsburgh and Duke. San Diego State and BYU moved up one spot to sixth and seventh.

The next five teams are from the Big East: Notre Dame, Villanova, Connecticut, Georgetown and Syracuse. With Pittsburgh, the Big East has six of the top 12 teams and eight overall.

Florida moved in at No. 17 after falling from the rankings last week. Temple is back in at 24. Minnesota and Washington dropped out.

Howard 65, South Carolina State 53

WASHINGTON

Mike Phillips scored 17 of his career-high 26 points in the second half to lead Howard to its most lopsided victory of the season.

Each of the Bison’s prior four victories had been by four points or fewer.

In a game that featured five ties and four lead changes, Phillips helped the Bison (5-18, 3-7 Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference) take the lead for good midway through the second half.

Phillips, Howard’s leading scorer at 12.7 points per game, took over with the Bison trailing 40-36. During an 18-6 run, he scored 10 points, finishing it on a bank shot with 3:56 left to extend the Bison’s edge to 54-46.

Phillips also was 10 of 10 from the free-throw line. Howard hit 17 of 19 free throws in the second half to help put the game away and the Bulldogs (6-17, 2-8) never got closer than four points over the game’s final five minutes.

The Bison entered the game shooting 37.4 percent.