Arizona (7-0) has jumped up one spot in the AP Poll rankings Monday, making the Wildcats the No. 1 team in the nation for the first time since the 2013-14 season. This is the 38th time in program history that UA has been at the top of poll.

“I think it’s great, it’s what we want in this program,” Arizona head coach Tommy Lloyd said about being the No. 1 team in the country. “I think we need to be comfortable being in this position, we’re not gonna get big heads or make it too big of a deal.

"I know when I came to this program, my dream was to make it one of the best in the country, and if you’re one of the best in the country, you’re gonna stumble into being No. 1 once in a while, so you know what? Handle it. That will be the message and hopefully our guys will handle it well. I think it’s great for the fans, it generates a bit of excitement, but at the end of the day, on Saturday, I don’t think Wisconsin cares. … If you’re No. 1, you don’t start out 5-0, you start out 0-0, so we’ll just approach it like that.”

The last season in which the Wildcats were ranked No. 1 in the nation, they were ranked the top team in a school-record eight consecutive polling periods from Dec. 9 to Jan. 27. Arizona would go on to finish that season 33-5 before falling short by one point to a Frank Kaminsky and Sam Dekker led Wisconsin Badgers team in the Elite Eight in the NCAA Tournament.

No. 1 UA will have its first game as the nation’s top team against No. 23 Wisconsin (6-2), who most recently upset then-No. 3 Marquette.

Wisconsin has had the Wildcats’ number throughout the two schools’ history, taking down Arizona in Elite Eight games in back-to-back seasons and leading 5-2 in all-time matchups.

Although Arizona is No. 1 in the country for the first time of third-year center Oumar Ballo Wildcats’ career, he doesn’t think much about the rating and more so about the games that count more later in the later months.

“Honestly, it doesn’t really mean anything,” Ballo said about being No. 1. “It’s not March, it’s not April, we have a bigger goal than just being No. 1, we’re just gonna take that thing day by day, come out every day, try to get better, this number stuff doesn’t mean much, we just have to get better as a team."

Arizona will host Wisconsin Saturday at 1:15 p.m. (MST) and will be televised on ESPN. It’s the first meeting between these two programs since the Wildcats lost 85-78 in the Elite Eight during the 2014-15 season.

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