Kansas University’s men’s basketball team is ranked third in the country in the USA Today/ESPN preseason top 25 men’s basketball coaches poll.

Defending NCAA champion Florida and 2005 national titlist North Carolina were tapped ahead of the Jayhawks. Florida received 30 of 31 first-place votes, No. 4 Ohio State the other.

Pittsburgh and UCLA are tied for fifth, followed by LSU, Georgetown, Wisconsin, Arizona, Duke, Alabama, Texas A&M, Memphis, Boston College, Washington, Marquette, Connecticut, Texas, Syracuse, Georgia Tech, Kentucky, Creighton, Tennessee and Nevada. Wichita State just missed out at 27th. Oklahoma State was 36th.

“You could say it’s a reflection on how the guys played a majority of the time last year,” KU coach Bill Self said of the poll results. “It’s nice to be ranked there. It’s totally different to play to that ranking. We’ve got a lot of work to do before we can do that.”

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Duke-bound: Kyle Singler, the country’s No. 4-rated high school basketball player who long has been rumored headed to Duke University, is expected to make it official today and announce for the Blue Devils over KU and Arizona.

The 6-foot-9 South Medford (Ore.) High forward, who attended the Oct. 13 Late Night in the Phog in Allen Fieldhouse, will reveal his college choice at a 5 p.m. news conference at his high school.

Several sources have indicated Duke is the choice, though the Singler family will only acknowledge a news conference is on tap today.

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Anderson update: Self made a recruiting trip to Junction City, Ark., on Thursday to check in on James Anderson, a 6-6 guard/forward who is expected to choose either KU or Oklahoma State in the next several days.

Junction City High coach Joe Hammett says Florida, Arkansas and Kentucky have not been eliminated officially, but KU and OSU are the definite leaders. Anderson is Rivals.com’s No. 34-ranked player.

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Rose to visit Illinois: Derrick Rose, a 6-4 guard from Chicago’s Simeon High, has dropped DePaul from his list of schools. Rose, who for a time had KU on his list, will visit Illinois this weekend. His leaders are Memphis and Indiana.

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Self clinic on tap: Bill Self’s annual coaches clinic is set for Saturday in Allen Fieldhouse. Cost is $55 pre-registration, $60 at the gate. The clinic, which starts at 8:30 a.m. (registration is 8 a.m.) will include talks from Self, as well as assistants Kurtis Townsend, Joe Dooley and Tim Jankovich and coaches from last year’s Kansas state championship high school teams. Those who attend also will receive tickets to the KU-Colorado football game. Several hundred high school, small-college and junior-college coaches normally flock to the clinic.