The top of the sport didn’t shift much this past week, but Dan Hurley and UConn look to be back in business entering conference play.

Here’s everything you missed in Week 6 of the college basketball season, and the latest Associated Press men’s basketball poll.

UConn bounces back

UConn completely fell apart in Hawaii last month. The Huskies lost three straight games to unranked opponents at the Maui Invitational over Thanksgiving, which threw head coach Dan Hurley into a bit of a fit. He even threatened to never play in that type of event ever again after their struggles.

Now, that seems like it’s completely behind them.

The Huskies have won four straight, including a huge 77-71 win over Gonzaga at Madison Square Garden on Saturday. Freshman Liam McNeeley dropped 26 points and had eight rebounds in that game, which was by far the best of his career.

That came after wins over Baylor and Texas, too, and pushed them back to 8-3 as Big East play starts this week. As a result, UConn — which nearly fell out of the rankings completely after its Hawaii skid — jumped up seven spots to No. 11 in this week’s poll. Gonzaga, now with three losses, dropped to No. 13.

The top of the poll didn’t change much this week. Tennessee held on to the top spot after Jordan Gainey lifted them past Illinois on Saturday with a wild buzzer-beater on the road. That improved the Volunteers to 10-0 for the first time since the 1999-2000 season. Auburn rolled over both Richmond and Ohio State to stay at No. 2, and Iowa State handled Iowa on Thursday before rolling over Omaha on Sunday to get to 9-1 and stay at No. 3.

Duke and Cooper Flagg picked up a pair of double-digit wins last week, but they dropped a spot to No. 5. Kentucky fought through a tough rivalry battle with Louisville to grab its third straight win. The Wildcats swapped with Duke to round out the top five. The first major movement came with Marquette, which fell to unranked Dayton on the road on Saturday. It marked the Golden Eagles’ second loss in three games, and dropped them three spots to No. 9. The Flyers entered the poll this week at No. 22.

The toughest part of Hurley’s schedule is now behind him. The Huskies will begin Big East play on Wednesday when they host Xavier before traveling to Butler this weekend. Though conference play won’t be easy by any means, especially with Creighton and Marquette hanging around, this feels like a chance for the Huskies to settle back in. They won’t see either of those programs for at least a month, too, which should help significantly.

Even though it looked like it could be over, UConn’s quest for a third straight national championship is far from buried.

“Maybe the people with the shovels and the dirt, maybe they were too quick to grab the shovel and throw the dirt on us,” Hurley said after beating Texas, via NJ.com. “Maybe, we’ll see.”

Games to watch this week

*Neutral Site Game

Tuesday, Dec. 17

No. 25 Clemson at South Carolina | 7 p.m. ET | SEC Network

Wednesday, Dec. 18

No. 14 Oklahoma at No. 24 Michigan | 9 p.m. ET | ESPN2

Friday, Dec. 20

rNo. 19 Cincinnati at No. 22 Dayton* | 8:30 p.m. ET | ESPNU

Saturday, Dec. 21

No. 16 Purdue at No. 2 Auburn | 4:30 p.m. ET | ESPN

AP Top 25

The full Associated Press men’s basketball poll from Dec. 16, 2024.

1. Tennessee (10-0)

2. Auburn (8-1)

3. Iowa State (9-1)

4. Kentucky (10-1)

5. Duke (8-2)

6. Alabama (8-2)

7. Florida (10-0)

8. Kansas (8-2)

9. Marquette (9-2)

10. Oregon (10-1)

11. UConn (8-3)

12. Texas A&M (9-2)

13. Gonzaga (7-3)

14. Oklahoma (10-0)

15. Houston (6-3)

16. Purdue (8-3)

17. Ole Miss (9-1)

18. UCLA (9-1)

19. Cincinnati (8-1)

20. Michigan State (8-2)

21. Memphis (8-2)

22. Dayton (9-2)

23. SDSU (7-2)

24. Michigan (8-2)

25. Clemson (9-2)

Others receiving votes: Mississippi State 158, Arkansas 151, Missouri 120, Baylor 115, Illinois 70, Drake 52, St. John’s 50, Utah State 48, Pittsburgh 28, Maryland 24, West Virginia 19, Wisconsin 18, Georgia 18, Oklahoma State 16, Arizona State 14, Creighton 12, North Carolina 9, Penn State 8, Indiana 7, Texas 3, St. Bonaventure 2

Newly inaugurated Mayor Kimo Alameda has joined the board of the Maunakea Stewardship and Oversight Authority.

The MKSOA is the state body formed in 2022 to eventually take over management of the Maunakea Science Reserve, the land on the summit of the mountain where the Maunakea telescopes are located, from the University of Hawaii in July 2028.

The authority’s governing board is made up of 11 voting members, one of which is the Hawaii County mayor or the mayor’s designee. Under the previous mayor Mitch Roth, that seat was filled by Doug Adams, former county Managing Director.

But under the new county administration, Alameda is taking that seat himself. The mayor introduced himself to the board at the MKSOA’s December meeting on Thursday.

“On the campaign trail, Maunakea has come up almost every time,” Alameda said. “So I’d like to share that I bring a lot of information from the community regarding Maunakea, astronomy, (the Thirty Meter Telescope) … all the observatories.”

Alameda said he had urged Roth, during his administration, to take the seat himself, “because it’s our island … it’s special to me, it’s special to all you folks.”

MKSOA Executive Director John De Fries said Alameda’s “intimate knowledge about different parts of the island will prove to be vital in how we engage the community going forward.”

Meanwhile, the Authority’s transition of power is still coming along slowly. Greg Chun, executive director of UH’s Center for Maunakea Stewardship, told the MKSOA it has a written inventory “thousands of pages long” of CMS assets that may be transferred from CMS to MKSOA.

In a presentation, Chun recommended that MKSOA begin the transition process by first shifting UH’s various land agreements over to the state “because those are probably going to be the most challenging and complex to figure out how this assignment and transfer process works.”

These agreements include UH’s general leases for the 19 acres on which sits the Hale Pohaku mid-level facilities and the 13,300-acre Maunakea Science Reserve, the university’s easement for the Maunakea Access Road, and subleases with all Maunakea observatories, including the Thirty Meter Telescope. They also include various land use entitlements, scientific cooperative agreements and site development agreements, which all cover a wide variety of conditions governing the relationships between UH and each specific observatory, Chun said.

Transferring any one of those agreements, Chun explain, will require untangling which parts of the agreement are UH-specific and which would be taken over by MKSOA as it assumes its duties.

Only once that morass is dealt with, Chun recommended, should MKSOA begin taking over actual UH assets, including Hale Pohaku and UH’s observatories.

All of this, Chun said, assumes that MKSOA’s various management plans and administrative rules are actually in place, which they currently are not. De Fries mentioned that the development of MKSOA’s own Maunakea Master Plan to replace UH’s remains in development.

Email Michael Brestovansky at mbrestovansky@hawaiitribune-herald.com.

HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) – Hawaii Island police are urging the public to avoid Kainaliu town in South Kona due to a structure fire Sunday morning.

Authorities sent out an alert around 9:20 a.m.

Police said the fire has closed both lanes of Highway 11, between Basques Way and Honuaino Street.

Traffic will be detoured for the next several hours.

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