I was not overly impressed with Ohio State this past weekend. Personally, I would vote UCLA, Kansas and A&M ahead of the Buckeyes--but what do I know?

How do you view how you vote for team each week? Do you vote for each team based on their performance that week? Do you vote for them based on their overall performance throughout the season? Or do you vote based on how good you think that team really is without them showing it in an actual game (the Jay Bilas way)?

I'd think that Ohio State is the weakest 1st place team yet. Everybody's argument with Ohio State is that they have only lost to Florida, NC, and Wisconsin. Their only wins against tournament teams have been against Indiana and Tennessee before Wisconsin. They struggled to beat Penn State at home. Sure they are #2 in the RPI but look who they've played? The Big 10 isn't very impressive. They have a non-conference schedule rank of 81.

UCLA is 6-1 against the current RPI Top 25. Ohio State is 5-3. UCLA should get the overall #1 seed in the tourney but everybody is still going gaga over Greg Oden and his "potential". Ohio State will be this year's Kansas in the tourney.

I'm curious, Brian, why no USC?

Here my thoughts on a few of your questions.
1) I voted Ohio State No. 1, and I think its win against Wisconsin trumps any UCLA win. Kansas is playing well right now, but is beating up on poor teams, and Texas A&M, I think is being underrated by a bunch of people.

2) I try to mix it between how they are playing on the season and what they have done lately. I will say that I put much more stock in what a team does during the week. But to focus on one game and a team struggling in a win I don't is fair. If that was the case, UCLA should be penalized for surviving at Arizona State two weeks ago.

3) I cannot get past USC losing to Arizona State, and I am not impressed with California or Stanford enough to move USC back in the rankings for that. If the Trojans sweep this weekend, trust me, they deserve to be in, and will be in.

I don't know if Ohio State's win trumps any win by UCLA. Since you are putting Texas A&M at 3rd, UCLA should have the better win. Ohio State's win was at home while UCLA's was on a neutral site.

Anyways, I really don't care if UCLA is 1st or 5th; I just really get irritated when the media (specifically ESPN) goes nuts over Ohio State, NC, Florida and Wisconsin but when UCLA is #1, they can't wait for them to lose (or they think UCLA will immediately lose because we don't have a dominate frontcourt player).

This will all be sorted out in a few weeks anyways.

I'm not sure how the win over Wisc. trumps any UCLA win.

Wisc. best inside player on both ends of the court, the one guy who could have forced Oden to come from under the basket, dislocates his elbow in the first half, leaving Wisc. as a donut team.

Yet, Wisc. has a chance to win the game on the road by scoring less than 50 points if it makes two FTs.

I wasn't impressed.

Brian -

If you're not that impressed with either Cal or Stanford, why do you use them as justification that ucla should move to #1 in your "Ranking Rhetoric" post earlier?

Enough with the homerism. Rankings, by their nature, are subjective, but there are certain -- albeit few -- objective rules. One rule is whenever the no. 1 and no. 2 teams play, the winner is no. 1 in the following poll, regardless of how well/poorly the winner played. Thus, Ohio State is rightfully the no. 1 team in the country for this week.

It is also objectively true that Ohio State's win over Wisconsin, who has recently been consistently ranked in the top 5, is bigger than UCLA's wins over unranked Cal and Stanford.

So long as UCLA gets the one seed out here in the West, I don't care about the rankings.

I also didn't see much in the OSU win. OSU wins by a single point AT HOME, over a Wisconsin team missing their most physical low post player, on a day when Wisconsin could not hit an open jumper to save their lives, and when they take 20 less free throws than normal. And yet if Taylor, a 78% free throw shooter hits one or both free throws with 20 seconds left, OSU probably loses. If Wisconsin had won, UCLA would have been a unanimous number 1. So the flukey missed free throws by Wisconsin makes OSU the better team? I don't get it. Sometimes a loss is not a loss (i.e. Wisconsin should not hang its head) and similarly a win is not a win (i.e. OSU should not be credited with a big win when they lucked out). My impression of the game was that neither team could stay within 15 points of UCLA (or half the Pac-10 for that matter) on a neutral court.