Dayton Flyers stay at No. 7 in Associated Press top-25 poll

There were no upsets ahead of the Dayton Flyers in the Associated Press top-25 poll, and they stayed at No. 7 for the second straight week in the poll released Monday.

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Dayton is finding out what it's like to be a top-10 team on the road. It has played in front of sellout crowds at Saint Louis and Richmond in its last two Atlantic 10 Conference road games.

"We definitely love to play in the hostile environments," Dayton guard Ibi Watson said Saturday. "Coach said we kind of earned it. We're a team that everyone wants to play. It's kind of an opportunity for everyone, so we have to embrace that and really understand every game is kind of a Super Bowl game."

Dayton (18-2, 7-0), which has won nine games in a row, went 2-0 last week, beating St. Bonaventure 86-60 at UD Arena on Wednesday and Richmond 87-79 on Saturday at the Robins Center in Richmond, Va. It sits alone in first place in the A-10, one game ahead of Rhode Island (14-5, 6-1).

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This week, the Flyers play at Duquesne (15-4, 5-2) at 7 p.m. Wednesday and then play Fordham (7-12, 1-6) at 4:30 p.m. Saturday at UD Arena.

Last week, Dayton became the first Atlantic 10 Conference team to reach the top 10 since Saint Louis in 2014 and the highest-ranked A-10 team since Xavier reached No. 7 on Dec. 15, 2008.

Tonight you can hear from Dayton Flyers Coach Anthony Grant and 'the voice of the Flyers' Larry Hansgen LIVE on 1290 and 95.7 WHIO beginning at 7 pm, on 'The Anthony Grant Show.

Dayton is now the first A-10 team to stay in the top 10 in two straight weeks since Butler was No. 9 two weeks in a row in January 2013. Voters ranked Dayton as high as fifth and as low as 13th. It's one spot behind Louisville and one ahead of Villanova. The only two teams to beat Dayton are ranked: No. 3 Kansas and No. 20 Colorado.

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This is the first time since the 1955-56 season that Dayton has been ranked in nine straight weeks. It passed the 1957-58 team, which was ranked in the final eight polls of the season, and is now chasing the 1955-56 team, which was ranked all season, in 15 polls, and climbed as high as No. 2. That team finished 25-4.

Dayton entered the top 25 at No. 19 on Dec. 2, following its runner-up finish at the Maui Invitational, and then climbed to No. 14 on Dec. 9 and to No. 13 on Dec. 16.

The Flyers fell to No. 18 on Dec. 23 after a 78-76 overtime loss to Colorado at the United Center on Dec. 21. They dropped to No. 20 on Dec. 30 before climbing to No. 15 on Jan. 6 and to No. 13 and No. 7 in the last two polls.

Credit: DaytonDailyNews