BALLOT BREAKDOWN: UConn still No. 1 as win streak reaches 34; Notre Dame has impressive feat

Connecticut continued its stay atop The Associated Press women's basketball poll for another week.

UConn has won 34 straight games dating to last season's NCAA tournament run which is the fourth-longest winning streak in school history. The Huskies will play at SMU on Tuesday before hosting Rutgers on Saturday.

Here are five things to know about this week's poll:

TAKING CARE OF BUSINESS: UConn just doesn't lose often to teams that it shouldn't. While the Syracuse men's team suffered its first defeat of the season at home to lowly Boston College last week, the Huskies haven't fallen to a team under .500 since losing to Villanova on Jan. 27, 1993.

UConn has only lost once since that season to an unranked team, a span of more than 200 games. That defeat was to St. John's on Feb. 18, 2012.

NEW CONFERENCE, SAME RESULT: Notre Dame accomplished a rare feat on Sunday, winning a conference titles in consecutive seasons in different leagues. A year after taking the Big East crown, the Irish won the ACC title by beating Duke on Sunday. That capped off a busy week with three victories which kept Notre Dame unbeaten.

Prior to this season that hadn't been accomplished since TCU and Louisiana Tech did it over the 2000-01 and '01-02 seasons according to STATS. Middle Tennessee, which entered the poll this week at No. 23, could also do that this year. The Blue Raiders won the Sun Belt East Division last year and are on pace to win Conference USA this season.

Kayla McBride scored a career-high 31 points in the victory over the Blue Devils.

"We definitely enjoyed that," Notre Dame coach Muffet McGraw said of beating the defending conference champion Blue Devils.

MID-POLL SHUFFLE: While the only change in the top 10 was Penn State and Maryland flipping spots at No. 8 and 9, only one team in the rest of the poll stayed in the same place as the week before. California remained 18th while the rest of the teams in the poll changed spots.

WELCOME BACK AND FAREWELL: Middle Tennessee and Iowa re-entered the Top 25 this week at No. 23 and 25 while St. John's and LSU fell out. It's the first time this season that the Lady Tigers have fallen out of the poll. They've lost four straight games and host No. 10 Tennessee on Thursday. Middle Tennessee has won five straight games since its lone conference loss to Southern Miss on Feb. 5.

BIG TEN SHOWDOWN: Penn State has lost just once on the road this season with that coming at South Dakota State. The eight-ranked Lady Lions have a chance to clinch at least a share of a third straight Big Ten regular season title when they visit No. 16 Nebraska on Monday night.

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