January 7, 2026
The Weekly Fast Break: A jolt to the system
'Dores are winning, ACC is scrambling & rookies are shining
The first Starbucks opened in Seattle in 1971 and inspired the coffee culture that has been a part of our everyday lives ever since. From local joints to drive-thrus, fancy foam milk designs to sugary iced coffees, and from snacks and sandwiches that can sustain us, coffee shops are gathering spaces that welcome everyone. Even non-coffee drinkers will find themselves lounging in a soft chair or cranking out emails at a rapid pace from a table in the corner. Time can sometimes stand still when you land at your favorite coffee spot. The best part is that there will never be a shortage of drinks packed with caffeine to keep us upright and moving on to our next challenge.
Continue reading with a subscription to The Next
Get unlimited access to women’s basketball coverage and help support our hardworking staff of writers, editors, and photographers by subscribing today.
Already a member?
Login
With 2025 in the rearview mirror, we have now landed squarely in part two of the college basketball challenge – conference play. Support staffs are putting in mass orders at the favorite campus coffee shop for the morning coaches’ meetings and players are stumbling in for a pick-me-up drink before practice. No longer can teams rest on their non-conference performances because their strengths and weaknesses are going to be on display every night against league foes. The intensity is turned up in practice, and the margin of error is shrinking. Scouting reports start with the playbook to stop top scorers and end with exactly how to defend the six side out-of-bounds plays your opponent may use. Now is not the time to be complacent – ask for an extra shot of espresso in your latte if needed.
The Weekly Fast Break is inspired this season by tennis great Billie Jean King, who said: “pressure is a privilege – it only comes to those that earn it.” Chasing a regular-season conference title is not for the weak – it will take long hours of preparation and the utmost attention to detail in games to be successful. Do whatever you need to do to give your season a jolt – and be sure to tip your barista on the way out.
Listen now to The IX Sports Podcast and Women’s Sports Daily
We are excited to announce the launch of TWO new podcasts for all the women’s sports fans out there looking for a daily dose of women’s sports news and analysis. Stream on Spotify, Apple Podcasts or anywhere you listen to podcasts, and make sure to subscribe!
Tip-off
And then there was one: Over the past several weeks, we have been tracking a unique convergence of undefeated seasons. While there are many teams on both the women’s and men’s side of college basketball that have no blemishes on their record, there have only been a handful of schools where both teams have been perfect. As of last week, there were two – Iowa State and Vanderbilt. The Cyclone women suffered their first loss of the season on Jan. 4 at home to then-No. 22 Baylor on a jumper by sophomore guard Talia Scott with 2.9 seconds remaining. Iowa State is now 14-1.
The last remaining school with two undefeated teams is in Music City – Vanderbilt. The No. 11 Commodore men are 14-0 and will put their perfect record on the line Jan. 7 when they host No. 13 Alabama. Shea Ralph’s women’s squad is 15-0 and now ranked No. 7 after a 65-61 win over then-No. 5 LSU. Sophomore Mikayla Blakes had 32 points in the victory, which was the first for Ralph over a top-five program. Next up for the ‘Dores is a Jan. 8 matchup with Missouri at home. They pack the venues in Nashville to catch a glimpse of the next big star in country music and now they are packing the stands at Memorial Gym.
Clawing for ACC greatness: In past years, the tagline for the Atlantic Coast Conference (ACC) has been “Accomplish Greatness.” Women’s basketball has risen to that challenge for decades, producing Top 25 and Top 10 teams year in and year out. Conference realignment added quality programs to the mix and created tough road trips out west. Currently, there are just two ACC teams ranked in the AP Poll – No. 10 Louisville and No. 22 North Carolina – while two teams received votes this week in Notre Dame and Stanford.
Four teams sit atop the league standings at 4-0 as of Jan. 6, including Louisville and upstart Virginia. The other two teams, Duke and NC State, started the season ranked in the Top 25. Although rough patches in the non-conference have put them outside the national conversation, both are still very much in the hunt for an ACC title. What is becoming more apparent each week is that the parity in this league will not allow one team to completely separate itself at the top (or the bottom). We are also seeing firsthand the thin margin of success that some programs had in the past due to one or more elite-level players. Case in point – Florida State, which loses Ta’Niya Latson to South Carolina in the portal and cannot replace that talent. The Seminoles are 5-11 overall and 0-4 in ACC action. Notre Dame’s struggles in conference play are real after losing most of their roster to graduation and the portal, including All-American guard Olivia Miles (TCU) and center Kate Koval (LSU).
Louisville is 14-3 and has won seven straight games since its two-point loss to No. 3 South Carolina on Dec. 4. Sophomore guard Tajianna Roberts leads the Cardinals in a host of categories, including points per game (13.2), minutes per game (28.1) and assists. Up next for them is a road game at Miami, which is 2-2 in conference play. This will be a matchup of two head coaches, Jeff Walz of Louisville and Tricia Cullop of Miami, each of whom surpassed the 500-career victory mark to kick off 2026. Ironically, both achieved the career milestone by defeating fellow ACC foe Virginia Tech in the span of three days.
No one will make it through the grind of the ACC schedule undefeated, but there could be some surprises come March as to who did just enough in January and February to have their name called on Selection Sunday.
Poll watch: The first AP Poll of 2026 feels like someone took the last two weeks and shook them like a brown sugar shaken espresso. The top four spots remain unchanged, but for the first time since the end of November, a new team is in the top five. Oklahoma is up one spot to No. 5, having won 13 games in a row, including two decisive wins to open SEC play. LSU drops seven spots to No. 12 after back-to-back losses to two of this week’s biggest movers. Kentucky (No. 6) and Vanderbilt (No. 7) are each up five spots – the Commodores have not been in the Top 10 since March 2007. Michigan State, who is on a six-game winning streak, is up nine to No. 15 while Texas Tech stays unbeaten at 16-0 and is up to No. 17 this week. TCU drops to No. 13 after their 87-77 overtime loss to Utah and North Carolina falls six spots to No. 22 after a 77-71 loss to Stanford at home. Notre Dame fell out of the Top 25 after two ACC losses last week (Georgia Tech and Duke) and saw their run of 85 consecutive appearances in the Top 25 end. It was the third-longest active streak, trailing only UConn (615) and South Carolina (257). Notre Dame had been in the poll every week since Nov. 29, 2021.
(Photo credit: Vasha Hunt | Imagn Images)
Star power
Southern Miss guard Jakayla Johnson, the leading scorer in the Sun Belt Conference with a 24 points per game, was named Sun Belt Player of the Week. The 5’9 graduate transfer had 26 points in the 91-83 loss to Arkansas State on Jan. 1, going 6-for-11 from the floor and knocking down 14 free throws. On Jan. 3, Johnson posted 30 points, going 11-for-20 from the floor and 4-for-9 from behind the arc in the 98-95 win over Troy. The Clinton, Miss., native is the only player in the league to have scored over 20 points in a conference game so far this season. Johnson is also tied for second most double doubles in the Sun Belt this year with four.
Big 12 Freshman of the Week honors went to Jaliyah Davis of Kansas after the rookie averaged 23.5 points in two games for the Jayhawks. The Overland Park native dropped 21 points in her return from injury against West Virginia on Jan. 1 in her team’s 79-72 loss. She went 9-for-14 from the floor, including knocking down three triples in 32 minutes of action. The 6’2 forward had 26 points in an 83-68 victory over UCF on Jan. 4, going 10-for-12 from the field. Davis has scored at least 10 points in all five games she’s played this season, including three games with 20 or more points. This is the first weekly accolade of her career.
North Dakota State is 13-2 and on an 11-game winning streak, largely due to the efforts of junior Avery Koenen. The 6’3 forward was named Summit League Peak Performer of the Week for the fourth time this season after leading the Bison to three wins, including two league victories. She averaged 20 points and 10.7 boards per game over the stretch, including 16 points and a game-high 14 rebounds on Jan. 1 in the win at Oral Roberts (76-68). Koenen, who hails from Montevideo, Minn., registered her 10th double-double of the season with a game-high 25 points and 11 rebounds at Denver on Jan. 3. The Bison won 81-44.
A pair of 30-point performances earned sophomore Talayah Walker of Georgia Tech ACC Player of the Week honors. This is just the second time in program history a Yellow Jacket has had back-to-back 30-point games in ACC play and first since 1993. The 5’10 guard dropped 33 points in the Jan. 1 overtime victory over Notre Dame (95-90), scoring 18 in the fourth quarter and overtime (5-for-9 from the floor and seven made free throws). Walker also had 10 boards against the Fighting Irish. On Jan. 4, the Penn State transfer dropped 30 points and added 11 rebounds, going 9-for-13 from the floor and 11-for-12 from the charity stripe. She is the first Georgia Tech player since the 2023-24 season to win ACC Player of the Week honors.
Furman’s Clare Coyle has been named the Southern Conference Women’s Basketball Player of the Week after the sophomore helped the Paladins close their non-conference slate with two victories. In the Dec. 30 victory against Brevard (110-54), the 6’1 forward posted her fifth double-double of the season with 18 points and 10 rebounds. Coyle, a native of Jacksonville, Fla., had 16 points and five boards in the 106-21 victory over Bob Jones on Jan. 3. Coyle now leads the SoCon in rebounds per game (7.5) and field goal percentage (59.1%).
Full Court Press
We will sprinkle in a handful of non-conference games between now and March, but from here on out, our focus is on the conference slate. Many leagues will pair teams as travel partners for weekend road trips while others will give their marquee rivalry games primetime billing. The turnaround time for travel and preparation will be quick, but that is what the caffeine is for – to power us through the challenges and perk us up to keep track of all these great games coming up (check your local listings for game times and broadcast availability):
Jan. 7
Saint Joseph’s at Davidson
Old Dominion at Marshall
No. 11 Iowa State at Cincinnati
No. 19 Ohio State at R/V Illinois
R/V Oklahoma State at No. 13 TCU
Utah State at UNLV
Wyoming at Nevada
Jan. 8
No. 10 Louisville at Miami
Virginia Tech at Syracuse
R/V Duke at Cal
No. 18 Ole Miss at No. 5 Oklahoma
No. 6 Kentucky at R/V Alabama
No. 3 South Carolina at Arkansas
Colorado at No. 16 Baylor
Oral Roberts at South Dakota
UC Santa Barbara at UC Davis
The IX Basketball, a 24/7/365 women’s basketball newsroom powered by The Next
The IX Basketball: A basketball newsroom brought to you by The IX Sports. 24/7/365 women’s basketball coverage, written, edited and photographed by our young, diverse staff and dedicated to breaking news, analysis, historical deep dives and projections about the game we love.
Jan. 9
Charleston at William & Mary
Drake at Belmont
UNI at Murray State
Jan. 10
Miami (OH) at Akron
Green Bay at Detroit-Mercy
No. 24 Princeton at Yale
No. 17 Texas Tech at Cincinnati
American at Holy Cross
Oral Roberts at South Dakota State
Mercer at UNC-Greensboro
Tennessee Tech at Western Illinois
Utah at K-State
Davidson at Richmond
UC Riverside at UC San Diego
Want even more women’s sports in your inbox?
Subscribe now to The IX Sports and receive our daily women’s sports newsletter covering soccer, tennis, basketball, golf, hockey and gymnastics from our incredible team of writers. That includes Basketball Wednesday from founder and editor Howard Megdal.
Readers of The IX Basketball now save 50% on their subscription to The IX.
Jan. 11
No. 22 UNC at R/V Notre Dame
No. 1 UConn at Creighton
R/V Georgia at No. 3 South Carolina
Wisconsin at No. 9 Michigan
No. 2 Texas at No. 12 LSU
No. 21 USC at Minnesota
No. 5 Oklahoma at No. 6 Kentucky
No. 15 Michigan State at Oregon
No. 4 UCLA at No. 25 Nebraska
Jan. 12
R/V Alabama at Missouri
Jan. 13
Tulsa at Eastern Carolina
Houston at No. 17 Texas Tech
UTSA at South Florida
*All statistics cited in this column are sourced from university and conference-provided statistics
Written by Missy Heidrick
Retired Kansas State shooting guard who spent almost 20 years working in Higher Education and Division 1 athletics. Currently working as a WBB and MBB basketball analyst for television, national college basketball correspondent at The IX Basketball, podcast host, WBB Naismith Award board of selectors member and run my own consulting business.
