LCSC women remain at No. 13; men crack poll at No. 23

 1-16-08

The Lewis-Clark State College women’s basketball team remained at No. 13 in an fairly unchanged NAIA Top 25 poll, while the men’s team re-entered the poll at No. 23 on Wednesday. 

The Warrior women, 14-3 overall, remained at No. 13 in the NAIA’s fourth poll of the season, but only the No. 6-8 spots changed among the top 13 teams. The Master’s, which had been at No. 6, fell to No. 8, allowing Azusa Pacific and Point Loma to climb one spot each. 

The top five spots remained unchanged as Union drew all 11 first-place votes to hold down the top spot. Also, Carroll College, which is 15-2, stayed at No. 12, and were 21 points ahead of the Warriors despite LCSC standing alone in first place in the Frontier Conference.  Westminster is the only other Frontier Conference team ranked as it climbed one spot to No. 23. 

Montana State-Northern and Montana Western received votes but did not crack the Top 25.  

On the men’s side, the Warriors drew their first ranking of the regular season as the No. 23 spot, just three points from No. 22 Jarvis Christian College. The Warriors were ranked No. 13 in the NAIA preseason poll, but fell out of the rankings by the time the first poll was released on Dec. 6. LCSC, which stood 6-5 at one point this season, has won six straight games to stand 12-5 and alone in first place in the Frontier Conference standings. 

Westminster, which LCSC defeated on the road to start conference play, is ranked at No. 13 with a 12-4 record. MSU-Northern fell out of the Top 25 after losing to both LCSC and Westminster last week, but drew votes as did Carroll College. 

Both Warrior teams will be on the road this week as they travel to Dillon, Mont., to face Montana Western on Friday, and then meet Montana Tech in Butte on Saturday. The women’s games will begin at 5 p.m. both days, followed by the men at 7 p.m.