Syracuse played one game last week. A home game against a pretty bad Coppin State team. They won in not-all-that convincing fashion.
This was apparently the greatest thing they've ever done in the eyes of the AP Poll.
The Orange moved up four spots from #17 to #13 in the newspaper rankings. They also moved up two spots to #12 in the USA Today/ESPN Poll. You can probably thank losses by Gonzaga, Xavier and Ohio State in the reasons why SU moved up as well. Hey, whatever it takes, right?
Jon Wilner hasn't posted his poll just yet but we can assume that his addition of Syracuse into the mix this week didn't hurt things either. The Orange are 9 points ahead of #14 Tennessee, 9 points they didn't have last week.