SPOKANE, Wash. -- Whitworth rocketed ten spots up this week's D3hoops.com poll to 8th, the team's highest ever rating as an NCAA Division III member.

James Jones is the team's leading scorer

Click here for the entire poll.

Whitworth won three games last week to improve to 9-0 overall and 2-0 in the Northwest Conference. The Pirates are off to their best start since beginning the 2002-03 season with a 12-0 record.

"This team has high expectations of themselves," said Whitworth head coach Jim Hayford. "This ranking is nice, but it is early in the year. This puts a bigger bulls eye on our chest for our opponents and hopefully we will continue to rise to the high expectation we have of ourselves."

Whitworth's rating is the team's highest as an NCAA Division III member. The Pirates' previous high ranking was 11th on January 6, 2003.

As a member of the NAIA, Whitworth was ranked 2nd in the Division II poll after finishing as runners-up at the 1996 national tournament.

This week Whitworth will travel to California on Sunday to take on the UC Santa Cruz Banana Slugs at 1:00 pm. UCSC is 1-6 this season. Whitworth defeated the Banana Slugs 84-54 in their only meeting last season.

One of the reasons Whitworth is 9-0 this season is all five starters are currently averaging in double figures in scoring. James Jones (Sr., G/F, Manchester, England - Univ. of St. Mary) leads the team in scoring average (16.3 ppg), followed by Ryan Symes (Jr., F, Palo Alto, Calif. - Delta Coll.) at 13.3 ppg, and Kevin Hasenfus (Sr., P, Lodi, Calif. - Delta Coll.) at 13.1 ppg. Jon Young (Sr., G, Tracy, Calif. - Tracy) adds 11.9 ppg and point guard Bryan Williams (Sr., Spokane, Wash. - Mead) scores 11.0 ppg and dishes 9.0 assists per game.

The Pirates are shooting a blistering 54% from the field so far this season, while holding opponents to 41.7% shooting.