Arizona Marvelous Ideas: Tracking Arizona in college basketball power rankings

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Where do the Wildcats stand in the eyes of national writers?

After a week in which they beat Nebraska-Omaha and lost to Gonzaga, the Arizona Wildcats (10-2) dropped one spot to 16th in the newest AP Poll that was released Monday.

They also rank 15th in the first NET rankings of the season, the NCAA’s official metric, which take a lot of things into account, such as game results, strength of schedule, game location, scoring margin, net offensive and defensive efficiency, and the quality of wins and losses.

How do other people around the country rank the Wildcats? Here’s a look at where Arizona sits in various power rankings plus ESPN’s Bracketology:

ESPN (Jeff Borzello) — 16th

A furious comeback came up just short against Gonzaga on Saturday night, meaning the Wildcats missed another chance at a marquee non-conference win. They are going to head into Pac-12 play with their best win coming over Illinois at home, followed by a neutral-court victory over Wake Forest. Not exactly headliners for the résumé. Star freshman Nico Mannion has really struggled shooting the ball against both Baylor and Gonzaga, going a combined 6-for-34 in the two games. That said, Arizona having a chance in the final minute against Baylor and leading Gonzaga for half the game without getting much scoring from Mannion could bode well down the road.

NCAA.com (Andy Katz) — 27th

The Wildcats drop after losing at home to Gonzaga. But this team will be in the mix for the top of the Pac-12 all season.

NBC/Yahoo! Sports (Rob Dauster) — 13th

I’m not all that worried about Arizona’s loss to Gonzaga at home. The Zags are really good and Nico Mannion is not going to shoot that poorly all that often. It happens.

CBS Sports (Gary Parrish) — 15th

Nico Mannion missed 17 of the 20 shots he attempted in Saturday’s 84-80 loss to Gonzaga. Arizona allowed the Zags to shoot 47.5% from the field in the game.