Top teams' free-throw shooting, nationwide notes, my AP ballot (cont.)

• By my estimation, over the course of any given game, the officials get about 85 percent of the calls (and no-calls) correct. Ten percent of the ones they miss are close, understandable errors. The other five percent are boneheaders. Sound right to you?

• Gotta go with Tennessee junior swingman Scotty Hopson as the most improved player in the country thus far, don't you think?

• What is going on with those Villanova guards? Corey Fisher was held out of the starting lineup for the Wildcats' win over Penn last week because he and Jay Wright got into an argument in practice. He played 37 minutes but was 1-for-6 from the floor. Moreover, Fisher and Maalik Wayns are a combined 14-for-75 from three-point range on the season. 'Nova barely escaped La Salle on Sunday night, winning a surprisingly tough road contest by three points.

• Speaking of Villanova, the school announced last week that freshman guard JayVaughn Pinkston would be suspended for the rest of season for getting into a fight at a fraternity party that sent two male students to the hospital. Pinkston was charged with misdemeanor assault. He is not allowed to take classes in the second semester and has to re-apply for enrollment next summer. The punishment was handed down by the university.

I certainly would never condone any kind of fighting, but this does strike me as a very harsh penalty. Contrast this situation with two other cases where the alleged victim was female -- making them much more egregious offenses. UNLV senior guard Tre'Von Willis was charged with multiple felony counts after a female friend alleged he choked her. He was given a suspended 90-day jail sentence after he pled guilty to a misdemeanor battery charge. Willis' suspension? Two games. Meanwhile, Baylor senior guard LaceDarius Dunn was suspended for just three games following an incident in which his girlfriend ended up in the hospital with a broken jaw. In Dunn's case, the female asked that the charges be dropped.

We can debate whether Pinkston's penalty was too harsh or Willis' and Dunn's were too lenient. Every university has a different mission. But at least you have to give Villanova credit for meting out such a strict penalty to a high-profile athlete. I'm sure Pinkston has learned a valuable lesson here. I'm also guessing that the next Villanova student, athlete or not, will think twice before letting his temper get the best of him.

• Through his first nine games, Arizona sophomore Derrick Williams, a 6-8 power forward, is 10-for-13 from three-point range. Just making sure you knew.

• I am officially retiring my Erving Walker Free-and-Three Meter and turning it over to North Carolina freshman Harrison Barnes. You want to know why he's struggling right now? Because even though he's only making 27 percent from three-point range and 79 percent from the foul line, Barnes took four more threes than frees in his first nine games. Gotta reverse that, young fella.

• The best part about Kentucky's week (besides getting two wins of course) was the way the Wildcats evolved their defensive identity. Notre Dame came out on fire, but only scored 18 points in the second half. Indiana hung tough, but didn't score a field goal in the final nine minutes. UK can be a really, really good defensive team if the guys stay committed.

• I visited with Bill Self at a lunch in New York last week, and he raved about Tyshawn Taylor. KU's junior guard has shown immaturity in the past, but Self said he has grown up a lot. "He fights me in all the right ways," Self said.

• Here's a blanket piece of advice to all television game analysts: Talk 15 percent less. I promise you nobody will walk away from the telecast wishing you had said more.

• Maryland has an All-ACC-caliber player in sophomore forward Jordan Williams, but the reality is the Terps' guards are just not good enough. Sean Mosley, Adrian Bowie and Cliff Tucker combined for 7-of-21 shooting in Maryland's home loss to Boston College Sunday night. Freshman Pe'Shon Howard, who began the year scoring 14 points including the game-winning field goal against College of Charleston, had zero points in 19 minutes off the bench. It's the fourth time in the last seven games that Howard failed to score.

• Two long-range shooters who are scary when they get hot: Georgia junior Dustin Ware (7-for-9 from three in the win at Georgia Tech) and Indiana sophomore Jordan Hulls (57.6 percent from behind the arc on the season).

• During my halftime segment on CBS last weekend, I was about to refer to a player as "the EF Hutton of his locker room." Then I realized that no one under the age of 38 would get that reference, so I bailed. It was a little depressing.

• Syracuse is the only top program I know of that never conducts a game-day shootaround.

• Who's the worst team in the country? Gotta go with Alcorn State. Not only are the Braves winless through eight games (all on the road), but their smallest margin of defeat was 18 points.

This week's AP ballot

(Last week's rank on my ballot in parentheses)

1. Duke (1)
2. Kansas (2)
3. Ohio State (3)
4. Tennessee (6)
5. Kansas State (4)
6. Syracuse (7)
7. Pittsburgh (5)
8. Villanova (8)
9. Illinois (11)
10. Connecticut (12)
11. Michigan State (9)
12. Kentucky (13)
13. Baylor (15)
14. San Diego State (16)
15. Georgetown (15)
16. Washington (16)
17. BYU (NR)
18. Texas (18)
19. Minnesota (19)
20. Purdue (20)
21. Missouri (22)
22. Memphis (23)
23. Vanderbilt (24)
24. North Carolina (20)
25. Louisville (NR)

Dropped out: Gonzaga (17), UNLV (25)

Generally speaking, it is getting harder to penalize teams for losses, because most everybody has some losses by now. Tennessee was my high riser this week, climbing to fourth by virtue of their dominant performance against Pitt. But if I think that highly of Tennessee, I can't drop Pitt out of my top 10, even though it was a de facto home game. Also, I generally don't drop teams for losing to higher-ranked teams, but Michigan State's loss to Syracuse was so decisive I figured I needed to at least move the Spartans below UConn, whom they lost to in Hawaii.

I was probably a little late in ranking BYU, and I'm probably overcompensating now by installing them at No. 17. The Cougars are undefeated, but their only quality win came last weekend over Arizona in Salt Lake City. (They needed double overtime to beat South Florida.) I ranked them where they are largely out of respect to The Jimmer. Gotta love The Jimmer.

Georgetown and Washington both suffered close losses on the road to Temple and Texas A&M, respectively. I wanted to drop them, but those are pretty good teams. Plus, look at who's behind Georgetown and Washington. I tend to look more at the whole body of work than just what happened last week, and I couldn't honestly say any of those squads were better.

Likewise, I didn't think I should punish Vanderbilt for losing in overtime at Missouri. The Commodores' one-spot drop was a result of the reshuffling from adding BYU. I also reconsidered my ballot from last week and felt I needed to drop North Carolina behind Vandy, since Vandy beat the Heels on a neutral court last month. (Kudos to all the Vandy fans who so lovingly pointed that out to me via e-mail and Twitter last week.)

I didn't like leaving UNLV and Notre Dame off my ballot, but I had to make room for Louisville. They are the next men up. There are a few undefeated teams out there like UCF, Cincinnati, Cleveland State and Northwestern who are garnering love from my fellow voters, but I'm not there yet. Call me old-fashioned, but I think you need to beat somebody good before you get ranked. The only one among those squads who has any kind of quality win is UCF, which beat Florida (currently unranked) at home.

Click here to send your questions to Seth Davis for his upcoming Mailbag column.