Gary Parrish

Pittsburgh, you may now proceed to the top of the national rankings.

That's the end result of a wild Saturday on which No. 2 Oklahoma and No. 3 North Carolina both lost (to unranked Texas and unranked Maryland), clearing the way for the Panthers -- who beat top-ranked Connecticut last Monday -- to rise to the top of the Top 25 (and one) late Sunday night, then the AP and Coaches polls on Monday. It's the only logical move, so much so that I imagine Pitt will get all 72 first-place votes in the AP poll and all 31 in the Coaches poll. Anything short of that will be proof that somebody with a vote isn't paying attention, and if such a person presents himself (or herself), that person will be Poll Attacked on Monday afternoon.

Here's all you need to know:

• Pitt is 25-2 overall.
• Nobody has more wins or fewer losses.
• Pitt has compiled this record against a schedule rated 12th nationally.
• Pitt has six wins against the top 25 of CBSSports.com's RPI rankings.
• Nobody else has more than four.
• Both of Pitt's losses came on the road.
• The losses were to the schools ranked seventh (Louisville) and 12th (Villanova) in the latest AP poll.

So to summarize, the Panthers have more good wins (i.e., wins against the top 25 of CBSSports.com's RPI rankings) than anybody, just as few losses as the other elite teams, and no bad losses (like Oklahoma's loss to Arkansas, North Carolina's loss to Boston College, Connecticut's loss to Georgetown, etc.).

Best I can tell, that makes Jamie Dixon's team the easy No. 1.

Any other opinion is a faulty opinion.