The Auburn Tigers are off to one of the most dominant starts in college basketball history in 2024. Bruce Pearl’s team is off to a 7-0 start, including wins over No. 5 Iowa State, No. 7 Houston and No. 13 North Carolina and a 6-1 Memphis team that has a win over the two-time defending champions Has UConn on his resume.

The wins over Houston and Iowa State, both of which were ranked in the top five of the AP poll at the time, made Auburn the first program since Kanas in 1990 to defeat two top five AP programs in its first five games. These statistics, along with their recent victory over Memphis in the Maui Invitational Championship, have led many experts in the sport to rank the Tigers among the top teams in the country.

Two of those experts, Jon Rothstein of CBS Sport and Andy Katz of NCAA.com, officially pegged Johni Broome and Co. at No. 1 in their respective polls on Monday. Rothstein, who releases his “Rothstein 45” rankings each week, puts Auburn at the top, ahead of No. 2 Kansas and No. 3 Marquette. Katz, who releases a weekly “Power 37,” also ranked the Tigers at his top spot, again ahead of No. 2 Kansas. No. 3 Tennessee and No. 4 Marquette.

Both experts have at least three SEC teams in their top ten rankings. Rothstein has Tennessee (No. 4) and Kentucky (No. 5) right behind the Tigers, while Katz has the Volunteers at No. 3, the Wildcats at No. 5 and Florida at No. 9.

Auburn is ranked No. 2 in this week’s USA TODAY Sports coaches poll, trailing Kansas for the top spot. However, No. 1 Kansas scored a fantastic road win over Duke last week, giving Bill Self’s team the right to retain the top spot in both polls.

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This article originally appeared on Auburn Wire: Auburn was ranked the best team in the country by two college basketball analysts