The AP Writers Poll is out, and no surprise Pitt is #1.

“I think it means a lot to our fans and our city and it means a lot to our university, much more so than to me and our players,” Panthers coach Jamie Dixon said Monday. “But it is part of the reason why we play and work so hard so I am glad for them.”

The Panthers have a lot of familiar names in the Top 25 with them as they are one of a record nine Big East teams in the poll.

The 16-team league had a record eight schools ranked for three weeks earlier in the season, but the return of Marquette and the first appearance of West Virginia made it nine Big East teams.

“I know I said a couple of times when people mentioned that we didn’t play any ranked teams on our nonconference schedule that it’s hard to schedule any when a third and now more than a third are in our conference,” Dixon said, laughing. “I think it’s a good thing. People talk about how hard it is but we knew it was that way when we were signing up for it. You want to play against the best and we’ll have that opportunity a lot.”

The Panthers opened Big East play this week with road wins over Rutgers and Georgetown. They won’t play again until hosting St. John’s on Sunday and Dixon doesn’t think all that time with a No. 1 ranking will affect his players.

“We’ve talked about different things from the beginning of the year and how you can either use things as motivation or let them become a distraction and this is one of those situations that’s come up,” Dixon said. “We need to use this to make us better and it starts today at practice.”

That’s a solid talking point on scheduling teams. Jeff Goodman is sold on it.

The awesome Pollspeak has the rundown on AP Voters. The two voters who put Pitt at #2 and UNC at #1 are from Peoria and Dallas. Disturbingly, where they put Pitt, could be considered their more defensible decision.  How about not only keeping Louisville in the poll but a spot ahead of Minnesota who beat the Cards. Keeping Memphis ranked. Both had Georgetown below UConn. Heck, how about putting Illinois a couple spots ahead of Michigan right after Michigan beat the Illini? I’m certain both voters put in their ballots before the Arizona State-Cal game last night, which I is borderline since the game started 9pm central for them.

Here’s the Pitt press release with handy charts suitable for framing.

I suppose to programs that have done it multiple times and have National Championships, this might seem like a nice but relatively minor event. Arguably getting to number 1, even in early-January is as much about about being high enough in preseason rankings and attrition of those teams ahead.

The time that truly matters is at the end of the year.

That may be true. It does, however, matter right now. This is a big deal for Pitt. In the 101 years that Pitt has played basketball, and however many years that there have been polls Pitt has never been ranked #1. Not in NCAA Tournament seedings. Not in the polls.

Even in this period where Pitt has set itself as one of the top-25 teams of this decade, they have never reached higher than #2 for only brief periods.

The polls come out later, but teams ranked 1, 2 and 4 all lost (here’s a couple AP voters showing their ballots).

Just an ridiuclously awesome thing to enjoy the reflected glory of what the team has done. I mean, I know it’s silly, but I’ve had a big goofy grin on my face most of the day just thinking about seeing Pitt in the #1 spot.

The players know to say the right thing.

“We’re excited,” sophomore center DeJuan Blair said. “It means a whole lot for us. But we need to stay focused and keep our heads in it, stay humble.”

The first Pitt basketball team to ever accomplish it. At least one goal achieved.

UPDATE (1:33): Here’s the Coach’s Poll (ESPN/USA Today) story, Pitt got 30 of 31 votes — one coach kept UNC at #1.