JUST-IN: Duke basketball hit with unexpected good news

Duke basketball is back in the top 20 following last week’s big-time victory.

On Christmas Day, Duke basketball rose five spots, its biggest single-week jump this season, and now sits at No. 16 in the latest edition of the Associated Press Top 25 Poll. It marks only the third time that the team bumped its ranking from the previous week.

The Blue Devils (8-3, 0-1 ACC), whose lone contest last week resulted in an impressive 78-70 win over then-No. 10 Baylor in New York City’s Madison Square Garden, began the year at No. 2 in the country. They fell to a season-low No. 22 earlier this month following back-to-back road losses to still-unranked Arkansas and Georgia Tech.

This week’s top five is unchanged from the last go-round, with Purdue leading the way, followed by Kansas, Houston, Arizona, and UConn.

Next on the slate for second-year Duke basketball head coach Jon Scheyer and his Blue Devils is a home game against unranked Queens in Cameron Indoor Stadium at 2 p.m. ET Saturday (The CW), their last non-conference outing of the regular season. Three days later, the Blue Devils host unranked Syracuse in Durham.