The greatest poll on the internet returns after an upset filled week that saw 7 top 25 teams lose including three top ten teams. To quote Socrates, “wowza!”
Real AP Poll:
- Alabama (61)
- Penn State
- Georgia
- TCU
- Wisconsin – Just keep winning baby, am I right? This team looks incredibly ugly offensively sometimes but undefeated is undefeated…I guess.
- Ohio State
- Clemson – Not much of a fall and I agree. Let’s not punish the Tigers too much for losing to a pretty nice looking Syracuse team on the road with a new kicker and Bryant getting hurt in game. Now if Clemson loses again, ding them for sure. But not after just one game in upstate New York.
- Miami
- Oklahoma
- Oklahoma State
- USC – Good lord they feel like the most overrated team in the nation. Even more so than those offensively-challenged Badgers.
- Washington
- Notre Dame
- Virginia Tech
- Washington State
- NC State / USF
- TIE at 16
- Michigan State
- Michigan
- UCF – Not only did they beat a healthy Maryland team by 28 but their average margin of victory so far is 31.75. They are officially killing teams.
- Auburn – Oh crap is this going to put LSU back in the polls?
- Stanford
- West Virginia
- LSU – Ugh, yep.
- Memphis
Dropped Out: SDSU (19), Texas Tech (24), Navy (25)
Receiving Votes: SDSU, Texas A&M, Iowa State, Virginia, Kentucky, Utah, Mississippi State, Iowa, Navy, South Carolina, Texas Tech, Marshall, Florida State, Georgia Tech
Josh’s Top 25:
- Alabama
- Penn State
- TCU
- Georgia
- Ohio State
- Clemson
- Wisconsin
- Oklahoma State
- Oklahoma
- Washington
- USC
- Virginia Tech
- Miami
- Auburn
- South Florida
- Washington State
- Notre Dame
- UCF
- Michigan State
- NC State
- Stanford
- Michigan
- -25 See Below – Final Verdict
See Below, What the Hell is That?
This is the most prestigious rankings on the internet, I can’t just give teams the final spot all willy nilly. I had a reader say that this section wasn’t very clear so I’ll try and state the process more clearly. Since many leagues will have a ton of teams on my radar, I only take one team from each league to start with. On rare exceptions, I’ll take more than one team but for the most part, I really try and weed out within leagues first. Then I see if my final selections have played any FCS teams or have had a bad game (for example a 3-0 win by a SEC school over a .500 Sun Belt team would qualify or a lopsided loss would count as a bad game). After those first two criteria, I take the remaining teams and examine their best win, worst win, best loss, and worst loss to make the final selections.
American Athletic Conference
I had Houston ranked last week but in a rare time of NOT giving a previously ranked team an auto look, the 45-17 blowout loss to Tulsa knocks them completely out. Navy had been ranked by the real AP (but not me) and their loss to Memphis also knocks them out. Memphis is looking pretty good but I also wanted to give SMU a shot but unfortunately despite a nice start (4-2), their two losses are lopsided.
AAC Nominee: Memphis
Atlantic Coast Conference
Despite FSU’s level of talent, the 2-3 record is still disqualifying. That leaves upstart Virginia who is 5-1 (2-0) and Syracuse who just knocked off Clemson. Syracuse has a worse record at 4-3 but all the losses have been by 9 or fewer and they scheduled tough with a trip to LSU in the non-con. Virginia hasn’t had a win as big as Syracuse’s and scheduled easier BUT that win out at Boise State suddenly looks a lot better thanks to the Broncos upsetting SDSU. Virginia slips by for this week.
ACC Nominee: Virginia
Big 12
Texas Tech was ranked a week ago but the automatic re-look went poorly because of their meltdown against the Mountaineers where they gave up 22 fourth quarter points to blow a healthy lead. That leaves WVU and….huh(?) Iowa State!!! Both teams are 4-2. Both have beaten FCS teams. Both beat Kansas (WVU not as soundly). The biggest difference is Iowa State’s losses (Iowa and Texas) aren’t as impressive as WVU’s (Virginia Tech and at TCU). Then again, WVU’s best win (Texas Tech) isn’t anywhere close to Iowa State’s best win (at Oklahoma). At the end of the day I think I’m going to go with the eye-test. WVU looks more complete right now so they BARELY get the nod over the Cyclones. C’mon Iowa State! Let this Hawkeye fan get you into my poll!!
Big 12 Nominee: West Virginia
Big Ten
Yeah, yeah, call me a homer but the only team even worth considering this week is 4-2 Iowa. It’s not my fault Maryland has a ton of injuries, Northwestern is 3-3, or Nebraska is 3-4. Blame them, not me.
Big Ten Nominee: Iowa
Conference USA
This is more of an excuse to talk about some nice football being played. North Texas is 3-0 in the league and leading the west division. In the east FAU is 2-0 and Marshall is 2-0 and 5-1 overall. This observation doesn’t even include usual stalwarts Western Kentucky (4-2), Southern Miss (4-2), or La Tech (3-3). Also a shutout to FIU for being vastly improved at 4-2. Really fun league.
C-USA Nominee: Marshall
Mid American Conference
Do you smell that in the air? It is the usual MAC push for some well run football programs. Northern Illinois is up to 4-2 with their losses by a combined 9 points (at Boston College and at SDSU). NIU also knocked off Nebraska. Toledo meanwhile is 5-1 with their lone loss at Miami. Despite the overall record being better, Northern has played a much, much tougher schedule so far. I’m leaning Huskies.
MAC Nominee: Northern Illinois
Mountain West
San Diego State, NOOOOOOO!!! I root so hard for ya, randomly. With the Aztec loss I looked at four other teams. Colorado State is 5-2 and undefeated in the league and their two losses are Colorado and Alabama. They also have a win over a Pac 12 team, albeit Oregon State. Boise State is 4-2 with that win over SDSU and their losses aren’t that bad (Washington State and Virginia). Wyoming has also righted the ship and sits at 4-2 but their lopsided losses to power conference teams knocks them out first. Likewise, Fresno State is 4-2 but their bad performances against power five schools eliminates Jeff Tedford’s rebuilding Bulldog program.
So. Aztecs, Broncos, and Rams. Guess what? The resume still favors SDSU. They have wins over Stanford and Arizona State. They also have a nice group of five win against Northern Illinois. Boise is 0-2 against power five teams. CSU is 1-2. The Boise game stunk but it is a blip on the radar. Just like Clemson, I’m not going to ding SDSU too much for their first loss. If it becomes a trend, yes. But not yet.
MTW Nominee: San Diego State
Pacific 12 Conference
Two teams sitting at 4-2 that are looking for some love. One is trending up, the other trending down a bit. Utah has gone 0-2 the last two weeks but by a combined four points. The opponents aren’t jokers, either: Stanford and at USC. Meanwhile Arizona is riding Khalil Tate to a 2-0 surge with last week being a blowout of UCLA. Thankfully there is a head-to-head factor to make this easy. Utah beat Arizona. I know the Wildcats weren’t playing Tate yet, but doesn’t that reflect some questionable coaching?
Pac 12 Nominee: Utah
Southeastern Conference
What twilight zone are we living in? An orange clown is president, World War III is about to start with North Korea, Kentucky is 5-1, South Carolina is 5-2, Texas A&M is 5-2, and the zombie LSU tigers are back from a seemingly ending death of a first half against Auburn before rallying to get to 5-2.
USC is the first team I’m knocking out. In addition to that huge injury to Deebo Samuel, they have two head-to-head losses to other teams in consideration (Kentucky and TAMU). I’m also eliminating LSU. I didn’t rank Iowa State or Syracuse because of notable upsets and LSU is in the same boat. Their losses (30 points to Mississippi State and Troy) are both bad. One upset doesn’t counteract two bad losses.
That leaves Kentucky and Texas A&M. Aggies are a terrible half against UCLA away from being 6-1 with just a 8 point loss to Alabama on the resume. That’s pretty impressive. Kentucky is one dumb defensive screw up away from being 6-0 and that’s even more impressive. Still, A&M’s schedule has been WAYYYY tougher thus far. They barely come out ahead of UK.
SEC Nominee: Texas A&M
Elimination Time
The above nine teams join Army to create a master list of ten clubs vying for the final three spots in my poll. The first criteria I will look at is who has played FCS teams and then look at any bad games.
FCS Much?…Oof, this criteria hasn’t not been knocking too many teams out until this week but now it strikes down THREE clubs. Army is 5-2 but their four FBS wins are Buffalo, UTEP, Rice, and Eastern Michigan. Boosting that win total with Fordham will not get ya ranked. Adios, Army. NIU is lovable but their 4-2 record turns into 3-2 without counting that win over Eastern Illinois. Buenas noches, Northern. And then there was Utah. Yes they’ve had some tight games but the fact is they are just 4-2 with a win over North Dakota propping up that tent…not to mention wins against awful BYU and San Jose State. Vaarwel, Utes.
Bad Game(s)…For some Memphis has done enough to overcome that loss to UCF but I’m not as sure. Does a 3 point win over a questionably ranked Navy team counteract a 27 point loss to the Knights? Big opportunity against Houston this week though. Memphis is out for this week but sniffing around. Virginia had a 13 point loss to Indiana. Their two ACC wins over Duke and North Carolina by a combined 13 points is concerning because of the lack of pop against power league teams. Nice start but they don’t feel like one of the 25 best teams in the nation yet.
Final Five
From ten to five as I search for my 23rd, 24th and 25th ranked teams. For this I try to just look at a couple of games: each team’s best win, worst win, best loss (i.e. a moral victory), and worst loss.
- Iowa
- BW: at Iowa State
- WW: Illinois
- BL: Penn State (by 2)
- WL: at Michigan State (by 7)
- Marshall
- BW: at Cincinnati (?)
- WW: at Charlotte
- BL: at NC State (by 17)
- WL: N/A
- SDSU
- BW: Stanford
- WW: FCS
- BL: N/A
- WL: Boise State (by 17)
- Texas A&M
- BW: South Carolina
- WW: FCS
- BL: Alabama (by 8)
- WL: at UCLA (by 1)
- West Virginia
- BW: Texas Tech
- WW: FCS (or Kansas)
- BL: TCU/Va Tech (both by 7)
- WL: N/A
The first thing that immediately catches my eye is Marshall’s lack of a marquee win. They are racking up wins but against who? Really like the turnaround for Doc Holiday’s team but they aren’t worthy of a ranking quite yet. Another thing I noticed right away is Texas A&M’s quality of losses. A game in which their starting qb got hurt, things fell apart but they have rallied nicely around Kellen Mond since. They’ll be in, but where?
SDSU is also in. Those wins over Arizona State and Stanford more than make up for the Boise game. They will probably end with more Pac 12 wins than Oregon State. That’s hilarious and impressive.
So how to sort out West Virginia and Iowa? How about opponent’s win-loss. First I’ll look at just their wins:
- Iowa wins: 14-10
- Iowa total: 25-11
- WVU wins: 6-19
- WVU overall: 17-20
Okay, NOW you can call me a homer.
Final Verdict:
23. San Diego State
24. Texas A&M
25. Iowa
League Breakdown:
6 – Big Ten
4 – ACC, Pac 12, SEC
3 – Big 12
2 – American
1 – Independent, Mountain West
Big Ten and Counting 