Georgia is preparing for its first national championship game in a long time. Georgia men's basketball is at the bottom of the SEC with a 5-9 record. Their last five games were a loss to George Mason, a single-digit victory over Western Carolina, a loss to East Tennessee, and a loss to Texas A&M.
When the men's basketball AP Poll was released on January 3, it was a shock to see Georgia in the category of "also receiving votes."
Georgia received 22 votes and was ranked fourth in the country. How does this happen? It has to be a mistake. Yes, as it turns out. It was.
The author of this mystery is Stephen Tsai. Georgia was ranked fourth in the country.
Why? It turns out that the Georgia logo was mistaken for the one from Gonzaga. He thought he was voting for the 11-2 Gonzaga Bulldogs, but ended up voting for the 8-7 Georgia Dogs. The AP Poll no longer has Georgia listed as a place to vote after an error was fixed and an official statement was never offered by Tsai.
I am pretty sure that Tsai will live until the end of the college basketball season because he made a mistake. It happens to the best of us. Maria Taylor forgot to include Anthony Davis on her All-NBA ballot in 2020. She was defended by many other All-NBA voters who claimed they had made similar mistakes in the past.
The Associated Press contacted Tsai quickly and fixed the problem, which is a positive thing. It took less than a day for them to reach out and confirm that he made a mistake. Having the flexibility to fix obvious mistakes is an important factor for helping make sure voters never feel pressured to be 100 percent accurate all the time.
When Major League Baseball implemented their replay review system, the AP realized that sometimes oversights happen and being able to fix them will help the sport in the long run. The integrity of college basketball or the AP rankings shouldn't be jeopardized by these lapse in concentration. It is good to see that this one did not. It is pretty damn funny.
