There's one month until the NCAA Tournament selection show and there are still many teams battling to get off the bubble and into the field.
South Florida (18-8) has won seven straight games, including a triple-overtime victory over Rice last week, to get into the at-large conversation if the Bulls don't win the conference tournament. They face Charlotte and Memphis this week. Jose Fernandez's team needed overtime to beat Charlotte the first time they met.
George Mason at Saint Joseph's, Sunday. Once again, two of the top teams in the Atlantic-10 meet with second place on the line. The Patriots have won 11 straight games and are 13-2 in the conference. The Hawks lost to first-place Richmond last Thursday and are 11-3 in the league.
Columbia at Princeton, Saturday. First place in the Ivy League will be at stake when the Lions visit the Tigers. The two teams are tied with one loss apiece after Columbia fell to Harvard on Sunday. The three teams are all in the hunt for NCAA Tournament bids. Harvard has the highest NET rating at 34. Columbia is at 42 and Princeton 49.
Belmont: The Bruins are 0-6 against top teams (Quadrant 1) this season, but two of those losses were close with a four-point defeat to Ohio State and a six-point one to Kentucky. They currently are tied for second in the Missouri Valley Conference after losing to Drake over the weekend and have a NET rating of 59.
Top 16 Reveal: The NCAA selection committee unveiled its top 16 teams Sunday to that point in the season and it didn't take long for the reveal to get upended. UCLA, South Carolina, Texas and Notre Dame were the top four seeds in the committee's mind. The Gamecocks were routed by UConn a few hours after the unveiling. The NCAA will have one more reveal on Feb. 27.
Get poll alerts and updates on the AP Top 25 throughout the season. Sign up here. AP women’s college basketball: https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-womens-college-basketball-poll and https://apnews.com/hub/womens-college-basketball
FILE - Columbia head coach Megan Griffith looks on during the first half of an NCAA Ivy League women's college basketball championship game against Princeton, March 12, 2022, in Cambridge, Mass. (AP Photo/Mary Schwalm, File)
FILE - Princeton head coach Carla Berube calls a play for her team in the first half of a college basketball game against Kentucky in the first round of the NCAA tournament in Bloomington, Ind., March 19, 2022. (AP Photo/Michael Conroy, File)
ALEPPO, Syria (AP) — First responders on Sunday entered a contested neighborhood in Syria’ s northern city of Aleppo after days of deadly clashes between government forces and Kurdish-led forces. Syrian state media said the military was deployed in large numbers.
The clashes broke out Tuesday in the predominantly Kurdish neighborhoods of Sheikh Maqsoud, Achrafieh and Bani Zaid after the government and the Syrian Democratic Forces, the main Kurdish-led force in the country, failed to make progress on how to merge the SDF into the national army. Security forces captured Achrafieh and Bani Zaid.
The fighting between the two sides was the most intense since the fall of then-President Bashar Assad to insurgents in December 2024. At least 23 people were killed in five days of clashes and more than 140,000 were displaced amid shelling and drone strikes.
The U.S.-backed SDF, which have played a key role in combating the Islamic State group in large swaths of eastern Syria, are the largest force yet to be absorbed into Syria's national army. Some of the factions that make up the army, however, were previously Turkish-backed insurgent groups that have a long history of clashing with Kurdish forces.
The Kurdish fighters have now evacuated from the Sheikh Maqsoud neighborhood to northeastern Syria, which is under the control of the SDF. However, they said in a statement they will continue to fight now that the wounded and civilians have been evacuated, in what they called a “partial ceasefire.”
The neighborhood appeared calm Sunday. The United Nations said it was trying to dispatch more convoys to the neighborhoods with food, fuel, blankets and other urgent supplies.
Government security forces brought journalists to tour the devastated area, showing them the damaged Khalid al-Fajer Hospital and a military position belonging to the SDF’s security forces that government forces had targeted.
The SDF statement accused the government of targeting the hospital “dozens of times” before patients were evacuated. Damascus accused the Kurdish-led group of using the hospital and other civilian facilities as military positions.
On one street, Syrian Red Crescent first responders spoke to a resident surrounded by charred cars and badly damaged residential buildings.
Some residents told The Associated Press that SDF forces did not allow their cars through checkpoints to leave.
“We lived a night of horror. I still cannot believe that I am right here standing on my own two feet,” said Ahmad Shaikho. “So far the situation has been calm. There hasn’t been any gunfire.”
Syrian Civil Defense first responders have been disarming improvised mines that they say were left by the Kurdish forces as booby traps.
Residents who fled are not being allowed back into the neighborhood until all the mines are cleared. Some were reminded of the displacement during Syria’s long civil war.
“I want to go back to my home, I beg you,” said Hoda Alnasiri.
Associated Press journalist Kareem Chehayeb in Beirut contributed to this report.
Sandbag barriers used as fighting positions by Kurdish fighters, left inside a destroyed mosque in the Sheikh Maqsoud neighborhood, where clashes between government forces and Kurdish fighters have been taking place in the northern city of Aleppo, Syria, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)
Burned vehicles at one of the Kurdish fighters positions at the Sheikh Maqsoud neighborhood, where clashes between government forces and Kurdish fighters have been taking place in the northern city of Aleppo, Syria, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)
People flee the Sheikh Maqsoud neighborhood, where clashes between government forces and Kurdish fighters have been taking place in the northern city of Aleppo, Syria, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)
A Syrian military police convoy enters the Sheikh Maqsoud neighborhood, where clashes between government forces and Kurdish fighters have been taking place in the northern city of Aleppo, Syria, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)
Burned vehicles and ammunitions left at one of the Kurdish fighters positions at the Sheikh Maqsoud neighborhood, where clashes between government forces and Kurdish fighters have been taking place in the northern city of Aleppo, Syria, Sunday, Jan. 11, 2026. (AP Photo/Ghaith Alsayed)
