Week 12 Top 25 and CFP Notes 2023

Ratings and College Football Playoff Response/Prediction

The first four teams are all undefeated now, just in time to lose at least one undefeated team this weekend.  It happens to be the same top four as the CFP top 25.  I can argue until I’m blue in the face about Oregon, but I guess people like flashy offenses and uniforms (not to mention years of a hype and a nationwide ad campaign for the quarterback) more than they like a good strength of schedule.  It seems like they’re setting up the possibility of Oregon going to the Playoff in the event of revenge wins over Oregon St. (for last year) and Washington (for both last year and earlier this season).

Putting aside the CFP ramifications, I think Oregon might have some motivation to win this next game.

I don’t think Washington, Georgia, or Florida St. (another undefeated not in the top four) have much chance of a loss this coming weekend, but losses by none of them (except maybe Georgia) would be much stranger than the time 4-7 Pitt beat 10-1 West Virginia in 2007 to help LSU make the championship game. 

Florida and Washington St. have five wins apiece and are playing for bowl eligibility as well as in-state bragging rights, while Georgia Tech is already bowl-eligible.  A late pick-six is likely the only reason Washington beat Arizona St., who is only 3-8.  Despite one fewer win, Florida is a better team than Boston College, whom Florida St. only beat by 2.  Georgia hasn’t really come close to a loss though.

Alabama and Florida St. both lost ground compared to higher teams as a result of playing FCS opponents.  Alabama probably lost a bit less since the SEC gained strength with out-of-conference wins and because Chattanooga is an FCS playoff team.

I suspect that unless Washington and Georgia remain undefeated, removing Oregon and Alabama from the running in the process, the plan is that Florida St. will be excluded from the Playoff.  I don’t know if this was the plan before their QB Jordan Travis was hurt or not.

I don’t think the CFP standings after Alabama matter too much for the national championship, but LSU fans (ironically) should cheer for Missouri and Ole Miss to lose for a better chance at a selection committee (or NY6) bowl or at the CapitalOne Bowl.  It’s ironic because normally it would be a good thing if no one outside of the top 12 beat you and you had a top-10 win, but that’s not how the logic of bowl placement works.

It would be more logical for LSU fans to cheer for Alabama to beat Georgia (whom LSU did not play, if you haven’t noticed) in the SEC Championship game because that would retain the possibility of there being two SEC playoff teams.  This might not be the year for that to happen though given the possibility of four undefeated teams going into championship weekend.  There are also a couple of other teams (I mentioned Oregon; there is also Texas) who could be good one-loss candidates as conference champions.  I think one-loss Texas will go ahead of one-loss Alabama even if they shouldn’t.

Anyway, the rest of this is just about my ratings, not the CFP rankings or what I think they will do.

The Big Ten is now much closer to the Pac-12, which is now #3, as they can look forward to taking the Pac-12’s two best teams (as well as UCLA and USC, which are more in the middle).  They would still be behind the SEC, which will add the Big XII’s two best teams.

I mentioned Arizona St. earlier.  Oregon’s win over the Sun Devils allowed them to get past Ole Miss, who beat an inferior UL-Monroe squad.  Other relatively small differences in quality of opponents accounted for the movement in the rest of the top 20, apart from James Madison, who lost to Appalachian St.  Oregon St. fell a smaller number of spots for losing to Washington, which was a close game as expected.

I had a little bit of trouble figuring out the last two.  I strongly considered Oklahoma St. and Clemson, but they each had three losses that were all big negatives.  Arizona had only one bad loss and one that was mediocre.  Oregon St. and North Carolina St. only had one mediocre-to-bad loss apiece.  Oklahoma St. had the best list of wins, but the others had comparable good wins.  I didn’t hold the fourth loss (to Florida St.) against Clemson, but there weren’t really strong wins to counterbalance the other losses.

It might seem a little weird that North Carolina still has honorable mention status, but the four teams directly below them (Kansas, Utah, Tennessee, and USC) all lost also. Another interesting one is UNLV, whom I have never ranked in the top 25.

My Top 25

Rank	Team	Last
1	Ohio St.	1
2	Washington	2
3	Georgia	5
4	Michigan	4
5	Texas	6
6	Alabama	7
7	Florida St.	3
8	Penn St.	8
9	Oregon	10
10	Ole Miss	9
11	Oklahoma	13
12	Missouri	12
13	Louisville	15
14	Liberty	16
15	Iowa	14
16	Kansas St.	17
17	LSU	18
18	James Madison	11
19	Notre Dame	23
20	Toledo	21
21	Troy	20
22	Tulane	22
23	Oregon St.	19
24	N Carolina St.	—
25	Arizona	—

Out of Top 25: (24) Utah, (25) Memphis

Honorable mention: Oklahoma St., UNLV, Clemson, Memphis, North Carolina

Week 9 Top 25 2023

Welcome New Readers

Since I’ve been on WordPress, I’ve always gotten a big boost in readers for the LSU-Alabama weekend, but the last couple of weeks have been the best non-Alabama weeks over the past two seasons. I wasn’t able to look at weekly stats from before that, but given that I wasn’t really committed to this in 2020 and 2021 and LSU was pretty irrelevant anyway (I didn’t even bother to say much about the respective Alabama games, although 2021 was close), I doubt any weeks in those years were better.

It’s quite possible 2019 had better weeks, but I’m sure that was more Joe Burrow’s doing than mine. I’ve also done a lot less to garner views than I did in prior years. I guess I’ve gotten more serious about work and health and things like that, and I also spend more time just relaxing.

At any rate, I wanted to welcome anyone who is new to my page. I’ve been a pretty avid LSU football blogger (during the season anyway) since the 2005 season, which happened to be when Les Miles came to Baton Rouge. My ranking system was developed from 2003 to 2005 and improved in a couple of ways since then, but I only have an online archive going back to my 2008 rankings. I don’t mind that because they became a little more sophisticated that year (qualifying for Massey’s comparison site) anyway. I’ve done a personal ranking since 1995, but to my knowledge I haven’t published anything I wrote before 2006.

Although I am an LSU fan, I’m very strict about not letting my personal views affect my computer ratings. In fact, at this moment, on my list LSU is as lower as or lower than they are on any other ratings list that Massey indices. This is not to be confused with top 25 rankings blogs like the one below that deviate less and less from the computer ratings as the season progresses.

Comments about CFP Rankings

I made an unexpected trip to the dentist on Tuesday, so I didn’t have the time to post this that I originally thought I would have. The delay does give me the occasion to comment on the first College Football Playoff rankings. Obviously, I agree with #1; but if you’re disregarding last year and basing the order of the top four solely based on quality of this year’s wins, there is no logical way to place Florida St. below Michigan and Georgia. If you are basing it on prior years and think Georgia is close to #1, why not keep them #1 until they lose, especially since that could be any week as the Bulldogs get into the difficult portion of their schedule (following the win over Florida with games against Missouri, Ole Miss, Tennessee, and Georgia Tech in consecutive weeks).

What if I told you there is an SEC game this weekend that will likely decide the division wherein the one-loss team is trying to avenge last season’s close loss (which took place after giving up two late touchdowns) and that I’m not talking about the SEC West?

I don’t see the argument for Michigan to be ahead of the Seminoles at all. The last time we saw them before this season they were losing to TCU in the semifinal. I don’t think that gives you the right to rest on your semifinal-loser laurels for the next 10 months. Is it purely a prediction of where they think the teams will end up? When did we ask this committee to prognosticate like that? I thought they were supposed to evaluate how good the respective teams are currently this year.

Comments about My Top 25

I was not surprised by too much that happened over the weekend, although I wouldn’t have bet on both Arizona teams winning.  They had both been on the wrong side of some close games before, so it’s not like I thought either team was incapable.  Perhaps Oregon St. and Washington St. just don’t have the depth and talent (and possibly not the coaching either) to keep their early-season success going.  I would have laughed if USC had lost again, but one win and one loss in the last two weeks is probably the deserved outcome.

I feel somewhat vindicated that Ohio St. nearly became the computer #1 after I had to assist them the past few weeks.  Ohio St. has a much better remaining schedule.  Florida St. still plays Pittsburgh, who only has one FBS win, and North Alabama, a subpar FCS team.  Of course, Ohio St. still plays Michigan, who is much better than anyone the Seminoles will play.

I didn’t predict Kansas to beat Oklahoma per se, but I didn’t think the Sooners would finish undefeated, and a road game against a team that I had ranked a couple of weeks ago isn’t the most surprising one for the Sooners to have lost.  Oklahoma may also struggle to beat Kansas St. and/or Oklahoma St., both of whom have re-entered the top 25.

I know some people think if Texas and Oklahoma each have exactly one loss, Oklahoma should automatically be higher; but I strongly disagree.  Texas has a much better strength of schedule given the game against Alabama (Rice and Wyoming aren’t terrible either), and the Longhorns also beat Kansas

Another interesting side effect of the upset is that now there are five former Big 8 teams (Oklahoma, Missouri, Kansas, Kansas St., and Oklahoma St.) in the top 25.  One of the others, Colorado, was ranked earlier in the year and is still in the top 60.  The other two, Nebraska and Iowa St., are both in the top 45.  When Oklahoma plays Missouri next year, it will be the first SEC game between two former Big 8 teams.  Colorado will rejoin the Big XII, where four other former Big 8 teams will play next season.  Nebraska will remain in the Big Ten.

Kansas RB Devin Neal dives for a touchdown against old Big 8 (and Big 6 and Big 7) rivals Oklahoma on Saturday in Lawrence, Kan. The Big 8 conference broke up in 1996, and it had almost been that long since Kansas had beaten Oklahoma. Neal ran for 112 yards in the Jayhawks’ 38-33 upset win.

As I anticipated last week, I didn’t do any subjective ranking to factor in.  I did move teams up to three spots.  I was a little bit liberal about what that means though.  For instance, Troy, Oregon St., LSU, and UCLA were all between 0.350 and 0.360, so I considered that a tie for 25^th.  (0.01 is a typical gap between consecutive teams after the top 10, where many gaps are even larger.)  That’s how I got LSU as high as they are.  I’m going to elaborate just for illustrative purposes, but if you’re not interested in a detailed breakdown, skip the next three paragraphs.

I am more lenient toward teams who play in more difficult conferences and who have more understandable losses anyway.  Part of the reason is I’m less concerned about such teams getting away with anything.  LSU will either lose to Alabama and likely fall out (continuing the current trajectory anyway), or they’ll beat Alabama and this will avoid the volatility of being 16^th one week, unranked the next, and being back in the top 20 (or maybe even in the top 15) the week after that.

One of LSU’s losses was two months ago to a team that is still undefeated in relatively hostile territory (not a true road game but close), and the other was on the road and was just a matter of which team was able to score last in the last two minutes. 

I think it was right to have the gap between Oregon St. and LSU since the two teams who beat the Beavers have seven combined losses to the one combined loss by the two teams who beat LSU.  LSU’s best win Missouri and Oregon St.’s best win Utah are similar, but I give the edge to Missouri (who still only has one loss…for now). 

Falling 11 spots for a loss to a team with a winning record seems harsh enough though, so I was not inclined to let Oregon St. fall out of the top 25 completely.  Also, teams like Troy and Tulane (the other candidates for top 25 other than UCLA, whom the Beavers beat and who is lacking in quality wins) aren’t going to be seriously tested in the future like Oregon St. will be.  Three of the four remaining opponents for the Beavers (Colorado, Washington and Oregon) are more highly rated than any team that remains on Tulane’s schedule, for instance.  Only one of Troy’s upcoming opponents (Louisiana-Lafayette) is higher-rated than Colorado, and it’s not by much.  (All of LSU’s remaining opponents are better than all of the remaining opponents for either Troy {who already played Georgia St.} or Tulane.)

I mentioned UCLA in the last paragraph.  It was a little weird to take them out after getting their second-best win, but every previous Pac-12 opponent (Utah, Washington St., Oregon St., and Stanford) lost.  Also, they were 28^th, so the only way to rank them would have been to remove Oregon St., which did not make sense.

Wisconsin and Minnesota were in a virtual tie in the computer, so I included them both in the “honorable mention” list.  That list is usually only five teams, but I made an exception.  I believe Toledo is the first MAC team on the list this season.

Top 25

Rank	Team	Last
1	Ohio St.	1
2	Florida St.	2
3	Michigan	4
4	Texas	5
5	Alabama	6
6	Washington	8
7	Ole Miss	7
8	Penn St.	10
9	James Madison	13
10	Georgia	12
11	Oklahoma	3
12	Liberty	20
13	Oregon	17
14	Notre Dame	15
15	Missouri	11
16	Utah	9
17	Iowa	18
18	Southern CA	23
19	Kansas	—
20	Louisville	22
21	Air Force	24
22	LSU	16
23	Kansas St.	—
24	Oklahoma St.	—
25	Oregon St.	14

Out of Top 25: (19), North Carolina, (21) Wisconsin, (25) UCLA

Honorable mention: Troy, Tulane, UCLA, Toledo, Wisconsin, Minnesota

Week 8 Top 25 + LSU Update

I think this is the last week that I’ll add a subjective component. I might still move some teams a few spots, but it will be starting with the list the computer ratings give me instead of making some sort of ranking average first.

As for this week, after adding three parts computer rankings to one part subjective rankings, I then moved teams up to three spots.

Ohio St. was one of the few teams that I moved the full three spots. The Buckeyes play computer #17 Wisconsin next week while the Seminoles play Wake Forest (#74) and the Sooners play Kansas (#46). If the Badgers win, there will be a new #1 regardless. The other team Ohio St. skipped over was Michigan, who’s off next week. So there was really no other good option to select as #1 when considering the next opponent.

The Ohio St. defense forces a quick pass from Penn St. quarterback Drew Allar, who only completed 18 of 42 passes for 191 yards. The Nittany Lions arguably fared even worse in rushing, with an average of less than 2 yards per rush.

For future reference, Michigan does not play Wisconsin or Iowa this season (and also didn’t have an opponent like Notre Dame out of conference), so I would be strongly disinclined to move them ahead of Ohio St. without a loss by the Buckeyes. Ohio St. already beat the other three teams remaining on the Wolverines’ schedule (Purdue, Penn St., and Maryland).

The computer so happened to follow the following win chain. Oklahoma beat Texas, who beat Alabama, who beat Ole Miss, who beat LSU. I’m not promising to keep the teams in that order in the future; but for now it still fits the parameters I set out above, so I don’t see why not.

If you’re wondering why I didn’t similarly put Oregon St. ahead of Utah for beating the Utes, consider that Utah’s only loss is to a 1-loss top-10 team and Oregon St.’s loss is to a 3-loss team who is no longer in my top 30. Also consider that Utah beat a top-40 team out of conference and none of Oregon St.’s non-conference opponents are in the top 90.

Missouri’s going back ahead of LSU is simpler to boil down. Mizzou has one fewer loss and a couple of decent non-conference wins (Kansas St. and Memphis). LSU may end up with one decent non-conference win in Georgia St., but that’s not for a few weeks.

Despite having lost to Washington in the same stadium where Arizona St. should have beaten the Huskies, I actually was kinder to Oregon than the computer was. My kindness just doesn’t go as far as it did last week. The Ducks are still in need of some quality wins though. Colorado isn’t as good of a win as it appeared to be a month ago; and Oregon was the third team to beat Washington St., so that’s hardly a noteworthy achievement either. The Ducks still play Utah, USC, Oregon St., and a potential Pac-12 title game, which would probably be a rematch with either one of those or with Washington.

Speaking of which, the computer doesn’t factor in how ugly a win is, but ugly wins over bad opponents don’t get rewarded much by me. The computer put the Huskies #8, and I just let that be their final spot. UW had zero offensive touchdowns and took the lead when Arizona St. threw a “pick 6” on fourth down from the Washington 12. Had the Sun Devils kicked the field goal to take a 10-6 lead, I have little doubt that they would have won since the Huskies only managed a field goal the rest of the way and were still very much motivated to put the game away with a touchdown. Arizona St. still has no wins over FBS opponents.

I had no choice under the rules at the beginning but to rank Liberty and Air Force. The Flames have a weak remaining schedule though. They may get passed up by Air Force eventually even if they don’t lose.

Watch the “honorable mention” list. All three of the newly-ranked teams were on that list last week, which indicates the ratings are becoming a little less volatile.

LSU-specific Updates

You can expect LSU to fall further next week given the bye, similarly to how Georgia fell this week. Alabama is actually the computer #4 right now, so their bye will help the computers to make more sense. Obviously if LSU were to win, they could expect a pretty good move upward, but a loss following Army and a bye could see the Tigers fall out of the top 25 altogether.

This has no bearing on the rankings, but to give a couple of thoughts about the game… Given some of the mistakes Army made, LSU got some extra possessions, so the high point total by the LSU offense doesn’t mean much to me.

The defense is graded more on a curb, so I do give them some credit for the shutout. I’m still not sure they would have shut out a better-run option attack, particularly under the old rules that allowed such schemes to utilize more effective blocking downfield blocking, but I’ll take it.

This is after having a good second half against Missouri and a good game against Auburn. LSU only held Auburn to a few points less than Georgia and Ole Miss did, but 8 of the 18 points were given up after LSU led 34-10 going into the fourth quarter. Neither the Georgia nor the Ole Miss defenses had time to relax against Auburn since both finished as one-score games.

To elaborate on the Missouri game, LSU’s best win so far, the average Power-5 opponent who’s played Missouri gives up 17.5 points per half and LSU gave up only 14 in the second half. The first half (25 points) was bad, but Kelly sort of indicated it may have been related to play calls more than preparation. You can’t implement and practice an entire new game plan at halftime, so that makes some sense. It seemed like before that point the defense was scared to death a receiver might get behind them (even though it happened sometimes anyway); but now that fear is reduced, and the aim is more to hassle and distract the quarterback enough that he might not be able to get the ball to such a receiver anyway.

While I’m more excited by the recent progress by the defense, I wanted to give Brian Thomas, Jr., credit for making his three receptions count. He accounted for 122 yards and two touchdowns against Army, all in the first half. LSU had its 7th consecutive game with over 500 yards of total offense (a first in school history; second-best was the 2019 team with 5 in a row), while the Black Knights were held to fewer than 200 total yards. LSU also won the turnover battle, 4-0.

If the defense continues to hold teams below their average and the offense keeps scoring like this (not against Army per se, but it’s been consistent across a variety of defenses), LSU will be hard to beat. As Kelly referenced in one of the press conferences, no one is confusing them with the 1985 Bears; but that’s not remotely necessary. It’s not like 2012 when we scored 24 points or fewer in 40% of our wins. (It would have been 50% if it weren’t for an Alabama screen pass and a Clemson field goal in the final moments of those respective games.)

Top 25

Rank	Team	Last
1	Ohio St.	1
2	Florida St.	4
3	Oklahoma	2
4	Michigan	3
5	Texas	8
6	Alabama	9
7	Ole Miss	12
8	Washington	5
9	Utah	17
10	Penn St.	6
11	Missouri	16
12	Georgia	7
13	James Madison	21
14	Oregon St.	20
15	Notre Dame	14
16	LSU	13
17	Oregon	15
18	Iowa	11
19	N Carolina	10
20	Liberty	—
21	Wisconsin	—
22	Louisville	23
23	Southern CA	19
24	Air Force	—
25	UCLA	24

Out of Top 25: (18), Duke, (22) Tennessee, (25) Washington St.

Honorable mention: Georgia St., Kansas St., Tulane, Duke, and Oklahoma St.

Week 7 Top 25 & Ole Miss @ LSU Preview

Rankings

As this becomes more computerized, I’m probably going to spend more time addressing what seems to be inadequate or excessive rises and falls.  Ordinal rankings don’t really tell you how far teams are apart.  For instance, #10 could be 10 points ahead of #13 going into the week and then fall behind while #11 and nos. 14 through #17 all lose.  This would mean that #10 only loses two spots even though they lost a lot of points.  The same week, #18 might only be two points ahead of #25. If #18 loses to a better team than #10 lost to, they could fall out of the top 25 as a result of the teams behind them being closer to begin with and winning that week.  But that won’t stop people from saying, “it’s unfair that #10 didn’t fall more spots for a worse loss.”

No one does that in baseball.  No one asks, “Why didn’t the team that got swept over the weekend not fall behind the team they started 5 games ahead of?  I’ve seen other teams fall two spots in one night.”  The rankings below are still partly subjective, but if you want to know how far teams are really apart, you’ll get a better idea by going to the ratings page than you will by looking at the rank.

Specific Teams

One team that seems out of place here is Mississippi St.  They just lost to a team that was barely ranked and they only fell two spots.  The loss just canceled out their rise from the week before.  Three teams who were behind them are no longer behind them, one team who was ahead of them (Kansas) lost to a worse opponent and several teams who might have otherwise passed them up lost.  Last week’s #19, #20, and #24 all lost.  #22 and $25 were idle.  So if Kansas and the 5 other teams had all won instead, people might be asking me why I “punished” the Bulldogs so much for a loss to a ranked team.

Mississippi St. is ahead of two teams who beat them, but I believe that this is better than losing to a team who isn’t even being considered for a ranking right now. 

This is the case with Kentucky (who lost to South Carolina) and LSU (who lost to Florida St.).  Kentucky only had three FBS wins going into the week.  Two of the three lost (Florida to LSU and also Miami U. to Bowling Green), while the other had a very weak win (Northern Illinois over Eastern Michigan; the Eagles don’t have a bad record, but trust me).  As I mentioned, the computer is becoming a more important part of this, and the Wildcats were 40^th in the computer last week, so I guess a better argument is I shouldn’t have ranked them last week in the first place.  I think I didn’t realize just how underwhelming South Carolina’s resume was apart from the win over Kentucky.  I’ll pretend it was because I was just that confident the Wildcats were going to beat Mississippi St. though.

The other team who beat Mississippi St. is of course LSU.  While LSU’s best win (Mississippi St.) and best loss (Tennessee) are better than Mississippi St.’s best win (Arkansas) and best loss (LSU), respectively, LSU’s worse loss (Florida St.) was to a team who isn’t even close to being ranked while Mississippi St.’s worse loss was to Kentucky.   Also, two of LSU’s wins (Southern and New Mexico) rate much worse than Mississippi St.’s worst win (Arizona).  By the way, New Mexico lost to New Mexico St. (possibly the worst team in college football entering the game) on Saturday, so that hurt their rating even more. LSU did get a fair number of points for beating Florida, and Mississippi St. did lose a fair number of points for losing to Kentucky.  That and the week the Tigers played the Bulldogs are only two weeks out of seven though.  Going into last week, Mississippi St. was 14 spots ahead of LSU in the computer.

Tennessee QB Hendon Hooker looks to throw downfield against Alabama in Knoxville on Saturday. Despite leading the Vols to the win, his streak of pass attempts without an interception ended at 262, the third-longest such streak in SEC history.

Speaking of Tennessee, I did rank the Volunteers #1 in my subjective rankings.  I don’t think any other team would have beaten LSU handily on the road and then been able to beat Alabama the next week.  But again, that’s only 2/7 of the season.  Two weeks ago, Clemson was 16 spots ahead in the computer.  The Tigers haven’t lost over that time, so it was even harder to catch up.  I mentioned Florida St. isn’t close to being ranked, but they are still in the top 40.  Of course, Tennessee gets a ton more credit for beating Alabama, but it just doesn’t make up for the whole season up until that point. 

You might laugh since Alabama is exponentially more likely to stay that way, but both Clemson and Tennessee have wins over otherwise-undefeated teams.   Clemson’s was over Wake Forest, and as of right now you don’t get a whole lot more points for beating Alabama.  Clemson’s second-best win was over North Carolina St., who rates a little better than LSU does.  Clemson’s third-best win was over Florida St., who rates a little better than Florida does.  It continues like this down to Clemson’s worst win, which was Boston College.  The Eagles have seen better days, but that’s a pretty respectable WORST win.  Much better than Akron, Tennessee’s worst.  The Zips have no wins over FBS opponents and barely beat St. Francis, which sounds like an elementary school.

Clemson and Tennessee were close enough that I thought about overriding the outcome of my mix of subjective and objective, but Clemson and possibly some other teams could pass up the Volunteers after this weekend anyway.  A win over Tennessee-Martin will not give the Volunteers many points, and I don’t like to switch up #1 teams that often without a loss.  The only team other than Alabama I have ranked #1 this seasonwas Georgia, but the Bulldogs have a bye week coming up, followed by Florida.  Michigan was the only other team that even had 90% of Clemson’s overall point total (in the overall rating), but the Wolverines’ next three opponents are Michigan St., Rutgers, and Nebraska.  I think picking anyone other than Clemson (whose next game is against undefeated Syracuse) right now would be a higher risk of instability anyway.

Top 25

Rank	Team	Last
1	Clemson	3
2	Tennessee	7
3	Georgia	2
4	Michigan	6
5	Ole Miss	5
6	Texas Christian	8
7	Ohio St.	4
8	Alabama	1
9	UCLA	13
10	Syracuse	17
11	USC	9
12	Illinois	21
13	Oregon	12
14	Wake Forest	11
15	Utah	—
16	Penn St.	10
17	Mississippi St.	15
18	North Carolina St.	14
19	LSU	—
20	Oklahoma St.	18
21	Texas	—
22	Purdue	—
23	Kentucky	23
24	Oregon St.	—
25	Maryland	—
—	Kansas	16
—	James Madison	19
—	Coastal Carolina	20
—	Kansas St.	22
—	Florida St.	24
—	Cincinnati	25

Ole Miss @ LSU Preview

If you wanted to see the updated Ole Miss Rivalry blog, see here .  I didn’t have much to say about the game last year.

I don’t normally do this; but since an undefeated top 10 team is coming to town and I feel much more confident in LSU at least playing a competitive game than I did against Tennessee, I’ll do a bit of a preview/prediction.

The best argument against LSU other than atrocious special teams play is that Tennessee ran up and down the field against LSU a couple of weeks ago, and this year the ground game is Ole Miss’s strength.  I do think the Tennessee stats are a big skewed though.  Tennessee got out to an early lead, and the last thing they wanted to do was let LSU get some confidence (or give the crowd some encouragement) before halftime (like what LSU got in the first two SEC games, at home against Mississippi St. and on the road against Auburn).  So at the end of the first half, the Vols had incentive to limit the LSU scoring opportunities as well as limiting the risk of a turnover. 

LSU also needed to respect the pass though, because Tennessee could have scored 60+ if they hadn’t.  Alabama has some players who can defend the pass (both in rushing the QB and in the secondary), and they allowed 52 to the Vols. I mentioned there was a throw late in the first half they barely missed.  That could have made it 59 points.  Ole Miss can make a good play in the air sometimes, but they’re much less successful than Tennessee is.  I don’t imagine Ole Miss would give Alabama the same kind of fits Tennessee did when they play them in a few weeks.

Ole Miss’s stats are also somewhat skewed.  Auburn may be the worst SEC team apart from Vanderbilt, and LSU managed to beat them despite a general lack of a passing game. Speaking of Vanderbilt, that’s another game that adds to the Rebels’ 3-0 conference record (and was a game in which Ole Miss trailed much of the time).  Ole Miss also barely held on against Tulsa and beat some other less-impressive programs: Central Arkansas, Troy, and Georgia Tech.

The only team I’d call good that they played is Kentucky, and the Wildcats had some success against the running game.  They did allow one 48-yarder, but apart from that there were 35 carries for 138 yards.  That’s similar to Florida’s stats against LSU minus the longest run.  It’s not necessarily enough to sustain drives, which is why the Rebels only scored two touchdowns the whole game.  Kentucky has played well defensively, but even Northern Illinois had that many touchdowns in the first half against Kentucky.

In the game in Oxford a few weeks ago, Kentucky lost two fumbles, including the one above on first and goal in the final minute. Ole Miss held on to win, 22-19.

Don’t just take my word for it.  Despite having played Kentucky, Lane Kiffin said about LSU, “This is the most talented opponent by far that we’ve played.”  About the location of the game, he said Tiger Stadium is “one of the hardest places in the country to play,” and, “We’ve been on the road a few times but nothing like this.”

The fact that Ole Miss relies more on a methodical ground game is part of the reason I think LSU has a better chance even if the Tigers start poorly (which, to be fair, they have done more often than not).  Given that Ole Miss only scored 22 the whole game against Kentucky, it’s much less likely they will lead 23-7 at halftime as Tennessee did.  Even if a halftime score like that does happen, the LSU defense has previously caused scoring droughts to give the offense a chance (it was just too hard to do that against a quick-strike offense like that of the Vols; no one other than Alabama has brought about a scoring drought of any consequence against Tennessee, and even the Tide defense gave up 52 points in the game). 

LSU outscored Mississippi St. 24-3 in the second half, they outscored Florida St. 20-7 in the last 15 minutes and 8 seconds of the game, they outscored Florida 28-0 in the 21 minutes of game play before the fourth quarter started, and they scored the last 21 points against Auburn (the scoring was in 18:01 of game play, but Auburn’s drought was over the last 39:38).  So I think LSU will be able to take advantage of the seemingly inevitable scoring droughts by the Rebels.

By the way, Auburn scored twice as many points last week at Ole Miss than they had scored at home against LSU.  Auburn had a stretch (lasting about a quarter toward the middle of the game) where they outscored the Rebels 24-7.  If Auburn can do it, so can LSU.  LSU has obviously shown better ability to close out games than Auburn has though, so I wouldn’t expect Ole Miss to then win the fourth quarter by 7 as they did last week.  Ole Miss did score much more easily against Auburn than LSU did, but it being the first competitive road game for LSU (and this will be the first competitive road game for Ole Miss) overcomes that counterpoint.

If things do go well early for LSU offensively (as they did last week), we haven’t seen the Rebels have to adjust to being behind this season.  LSU had a clear advantage when they forced Florida QB Anthony Richardson into a role where he had to win the game in the second half.  The LSU defense did look pretty silly when they gave up an 81-yard touchdown run to him, but I don’t think Jaxson Dart of Ole Miss is quite that difficult to take down.  He can run for a first down like Jayden Daniels can, but I don’t think he can break all those tackles against an SEC defense.  I’m sure tackling technique will be a point of emphasis for LSU at practice this week too. 

Dart also doesn’t seem likely to do what Richardson did against Tennessee and go 24/44 for 453 if the Rebels get behind.  As I mentioned, Auburn kept it competitive until late in the game, and Dart only completed 9 passes on 19 attempts.  If that’s what he does when he’s throwing the ball sparingly with time to waste and the defense isn’t sure whether Ole Miss is going to run or pass (and leaning toward the run), how is he going to do if everyone knows he has to pass?  Dart only has an 11:6 touchdown/interception ratio and only 61.7% completion rate.  Again, that would seemingly get worse if he had more pressure on him against better competition. 

By the way, Daniels has a 10:1 touchdown/interception ratio and 69.2% completion rate.  Daniels has thrown for about 80 more yards, so they’re similar in that department.  I think it also helps that Daniels played a lot better last week.  I haven’t seen huge improvement in Dart, and I even watched him play for USC last year. For what it’s worth (not much), Arizona St. (Daniels’s team at the time) beat USC 31-16 last year; but neither quarterback played very well.  Nor did then-Trojan Kedon Slovis, who now plays for Pitt (when he’s not injured).

I could be wrong – Dart could have some hidden talents he’s just waiting to unveil – but I’m going to be really confident if LSU gets a meaningful lead (or like last week they score the first few offensive possessions even without a lead).  I won’t feel great if Ole Miss has a lead instead, but I’m not going to stress about it either unless it’s 20+ points early or they’re still ahead multiple scores late in the game and LSU can’t seem to stop the run.

LSU is favored by about a point and a half; and I think that’s based on some intelligent projections and understanding of the respective teams that I’ve seen, so I’m not pretending it’s a slam dunk by any means.  I just see an easier road to a win for LSU than I see for Ole Miss.  I would expect a final score around 35-31.  So that’s just one disaster on special teams away from Ole Miss having the edge.

2021 Week 5 Top 25

rank team last
1 Alabama 1
2 Georgia 2
3 Penn St. 4
4 Cincinnati 7
5 Iowa 8
6 Ohio St. 6
7 Oregon 3
8 Oklahoma St. 14
9 B. Young 9
10 Coastal Car. 10
11 Arkansas 11
12 Oklahoma 12
13 Notre Dame 13
14 Michigan 17
15 Texas 15
16 Ole Miss 16
17 Michigan St. 18
18 Kentucky —
19 Florida 5
20 Arizona St. —
21 Auburn —
22 San Diego St. 25
23 Wake Forest —
24 Texas Tech —
25 W. Michigan —

Out of rankings: (19) Texas A&M, (20) Baylor, (21) Fresno St., (22) Louisville, (23) C. Florida, (24) UCLA

I don’t really have time to elaborate. I will try to get my computer rankings online this weekend, so I want to allow as much time as possible to work on those. Usually I have them started earlier, but it’s been hard to get back into the habit of things this year.

I had a general rule of no 2-loss teams; but I had to make an exception with Florida, who had two close losses, both to currently undefeated teams (including by 2 points to Alabama, my #1).

Kentucky’s Chris Rodriguez, Jr., scored what turned out to be the winning points in the fourth quarter in Lexington on Saturday. It was the Wildcats’ first home win over the Gators since 1986.

Week 5 Rankings and Comments

This is the first week that I have published my computer rantings; but as I mentioned I did some trial runs before.  I won’t be following the order too closely for now, but that will partly explain some teams that may be in surprising places.

Part of the transition from subjective to objective rankings (for this year anyway) is a strict rule that the ranking of a given team can only vary 6 spots from the computer formula.  For instance, Georgia and Washington were 9 and 10, but they ended up 3 and 16. Likewise, teams that started 13 spots apart could be one spot.  If 6 seems like an arbitrary number, it is. I wanted the flexibility to put a team like Oklahoma with no losses ahead of a team like Oklahoma St. with a loss to Texas, whom I was barely able to include in the top 25. I had to leave Berkeley ahead of the Sooners though.

For now I’m keeping the top 5 the same as I had it last week, but I probably won’t next week even if none of them lose. I will give myself less leeway to deviate from the computer, and I expect at least Alabama to have a lower computer rating due to missing out on points entirely during the bye week.

North Carolina had no chance of getting what would have been the go-ahead two-point conversion try in Chapel Hill on Saturday.

Partly because margin of victory for the most-part doesn’t factor into my philosophy (except to fill in the gaps early on and except for certain narrow home victories), I am keeping Clemson #1.  I need some pretty strong evidence a team is the best to make a change at #1; it’s not purely about who had the best 5 weeks and picking a team in a vacuum.  The other candidates don’t have the quality wins necessary yet.  Georgia, with the win over Notre Dame, had the best argument on paper; but their second-best win is Arkansas St., so that doesn’t do it for me.  Alabama hasn’t beaten anyone in the computer top 50, and that may not even change if they beat Texas A&M.in two weeks.  Alabama and Clemson are a much closer 1 and 2 to other teams than earlier in the season, but I’m giving it another week.

Outside of the top 3, Auburn still has too many question marks despite being the computer #1.  Ohio St. is also up there, but the Buckeyes need a better win than Cincinnati (I never bought into the Nebraska hype, and neither does the computer). 

I decided to leave Boise St. ahead of Notre Dame.  While the Irish have the better win against an ACC team (since Virginia beat Florida St.), the Broncos beat Air Force. Notre Dame’s second-best win is over Louisville.  The Irish also have a loss, but I think Boise St. would have also lost, so that wasn’t a major factor.

Arizona St. (which beat Cal Friday in Berkeley) might not have an impressive offense, but the Sun Devils have had two impressive road wins with ball control and defense.

There are some unexpected teams after that.  Arizona St.’s being 2-1 against the top 20 with a third OK FBS win (over Kent St., whose only other loss is to Auburn) is pretty good right now.  Wake Forest is undefeated and didn’t come as close to losing to UNC as Clemson did.  SMU is also undefeated with a win over TCU.  Colorado beat Arizona St. but lost to Air Force.  More on the Falcons below.  Michigan St. lost to Arizona St. but has three fairly decent wins.  Appalachian St. is undefeated and also beat UNC more easily than Clemson did.  Berkeley is 1-1 against the computer top 10 with no other losses, so that was as low as I could put them.

I could have ranked Air Force and Virginia, but I preferred to keep undefeated Iowa and one-loss Texas.  Although LSU hasn’t had depth in its schedule yet, I think the Tigers look like a better team than Boise St. or Notre Dame.  Also, the Longhorns beat a better team (Oklahoma St.) than anyone Virginia beat. Air Force did beat Colorado, but I want to see if they can follow that up with anything before I kick Texas or someone who hasn’t lost out of the top 25. In the next five weeks, the Falcons play Navy, Hawaii, Utah St., and Army.

Not only did Kansas St. lose to Oklahoma St., but the Wildcats’ win over Mississippi St. lost its luster when the Bulldogs got blown out by Auburn.  So Virginia and Kansas St. are the only two teams to fall out from last week.

Hawaii’s Cedric Byrd II celebrates one of two touchdown catches in Reno on Saturday.

I had to rank Hawaii due to the six-spot rule, but I think the Warriors deserve it.  In addition to blowing out Nevada on the road Saturday, they’ve played three Pac-12 teams and only lost to Washington.  Oregon St., as usual, isn’t good; but the Beavers gave Stanford a game.  Arizona hasn’t lost to anyone else yet, although UCLA gave them a scare.

Speaking of the Pac-12, that conference has the highest computer rating per team.  There aren’t any undefeated teams, so the Pac-12 is outnumbered in the top 10 by the SEC.  However, the Pac-12 has more teams in the top 25 and doesn’t have as many teams below 100.  The SEC leads 3-1 in the latter category (Vanderbilt, Arkansas, and Tennessee against just UCLA). 

Top 25

rank	team	last
1	Clemson	1
2	Alabama	2
3	Georgia	3
4	Auburn	4
5	Ohio St.	5
6	Boise St.	7
7	Notre Dame	25
8	Wake Forest	9
9	Wisconsin	13
10	Arizona St.	22
11	SMU	11
12	Colorado	20
13	Michigan St.	23
14	LSU	10
15	Florida	6
16	Washington	21
17	Penn St.	14
18	Oregon	24
19	Appalachian	16
20	UC-Berkeley	8
21	Oklahoma	19
22	Oklahoma St.	—
23	Iowa	18
24	Hawaii	—
25	Texas	15

Out of rankings: (12) Virginia, (17) Kansas St.

Week 3 Top 25

I’ll include my thoughts about the most-recent LSU game when I go into detail about Vanderbilt later in the week.  I’ve been waiting to write about the LSU-Vanderbilt series for a while, but there is only so much to say about it since Vandy has not won since 1990.

There is a bit more to say about the top 25 games that weren’t against FCS opponents and the new members of the top 25.  This is still primarily subjective, but I did try out my ratings system for the first time.  It’s pointless to even look at it before everyone plays an FBS opponent, so that’s why I hadn’t looked before.  Now that that’s happened, the system has given me a little bit of guidance; but it’s still somewhat limited.

For the new teams last week, I just added teams who beat opponents I previously thought were good.  That didn’t work out particularly well.  USC promptly lost to BYU, and Maryland promptly lost to Temple.  I don’t believe BYU or Temple belong in the top 25.  BYU should have lost to Tennessee, who I wouldn’t even put in my top 75.  Temple is closer, but I put that win down to Maryland being inconsistent (as usual) more than I put it down to Temple being very good.  Cal, the third team I added after last week, did win; but the Bears didn’t do very much to separate themselves from their opponent North Texas, whose only win is over a basically winless FCS team (I don’t count wins over Division II or lower).

BYU’s Dax Milne catches a 30-yard touchdown pass from Zach Wilson to put the Cougars ahead of USC in the second quarter in Provo on Saturday.

There are very basic observations this early that my computer system is not capable of.  For instance, it doesn’t realize Texas is harder to beat than USC.  They both faced three FBS opponents, and they’re both 2-1.  The opponents of both Texas and USC have a total of 3 wins against FBS opponents (LSU and Louisiana Tech combine for three as do BYU and Stanford).  I don’t add any inputs for how teams did last season or in any recent seasons, so it takes time to differentiate quality wins better.

Number 1 on the computer list is Auburn.  Only 7 teams are 3-0 against FBS teams at this point.  Only one of the Tigers’ three opponents has a loss to another team, and two of those opponents have wins over an FBS team.  All three have wins over FCS teams. Eighty-five of 130 teams have FCS wins, so it’s hard to have a better schedule so far among the unbeaten teams.  You could argue Ohio St. has a better schedule because their opponents had four wins over FBS team.  However, one of the four FBS wins by the Buckeyes’ opponents (Cincinnati over UCLA) was over a completely winless team, and the three other wins by Buckeyes’ opponents were over teams who are winless against the FBS. 

It only goes downhill from there.  In the computer, the worst 3-0 (vs. FBS) team is Alabama, who beat South Carolina (which counts for zero points since they’ve only beaten a winless FCS team) and New Mexico St. (who is completely winless).  Alabama did beat Duke, who beat Middle Tennessee; but as you might guess Middle Tennessee is also winless against FBS opponents. Anyway, this is why I said this early you have to look at more than wins and losses even though later in the year I move away from that.  I think we’ve seen more evidence of the ability to win championships by Alabama than Auburn even though Auburn has had more accomplishments so far.

Alabama QB Tua Tagovailoa has been able to wear down the defenses he’s faced so far, but his coach expressed frustration that the Tide hasn’t been tested against better opponents.

Anyway, I’m not relying on the computer rankings to tell me if one team is better than another, but I did use it to find suggestions for teams to add to the top 25.  Three were teams I was already strongly considering: Arizona St. (which beat Michigan St.), Iowa (which beat Iowa St.), and Wake Forest (which beat North Carolina).  I’m not about to put them in the top 10 like the computer has them, but I think they’ve had a good enough 3 weeks to belong where I put them. 

Kansas St. was not one I was thinking of, but the Wildcats are 3-0 and have a win over Mississippi St.  Otherwise they beat a bad FBS team and a good FCS team.  Another candidate was Virginia, who has a very similar profile; but I think it’s harder to beat Mississippi St than Florida St. right now, especially since the Wildcats went on the road to beat the Bulldogs while the Cavaliers beat the Seminoles at home.

Despite what I said about the North Texas game, I still think Cal’s win over Washington will turn out to be a very good one. So I’m not inclined to take the Bears out of the top 25 unless there is a loss. They go on the road to face Ole Miss before two fairly tough in-conference opponents (Arizona St. and Oregon), so we will soon see how much of a fluke the Washington win was.

Top 25

rank	team	last
1	Clemson	1
2	Alabama	2
3	Georgia	3
4	LSU	4
5	Ohio St.	5
6	Notre Dame	6
7	Auburn	7
8	Florida	8
9	Wash. St.	9
10	Oklahoma	10
11	Michigan	11
12	Texas A&M	12
13	Utah	13
14	Texas	14
15	C. Florida	15
16	Penn St.	17
17	Appalachian	18
18	Arizona St.	—
19	Iowa	—
20	Wake Forest	—
21	Cincinnati	21
22	Boise St.	22
23	Oregon	23
24	UC-Berkeley	25
25	Kansas St.	—

Out of top 25: (16) Michigan St., (19) USC, (20) Maryland, (24) Iowa St.

LSU More Qualified for #3 Seed Than Kansas

For more background about LSU, see my blog before last week’s games.

I started seeing LSU projected as a three-seed when they beat Tennessee, but I’ve been waiting on probably the most famous prognosticator Joe Lunardi to put the Tigers there.  As of Friday, he still had not done so (I’m using archived links because these pages are updated frequently).  A ton of fans say their team should be higher and are vague about what team should move down in their stead, but I’m not.  It’s Kansas. 

LSU’s substitute point guard Javonte Smart (with ball) was fouled with about 1 second left before hitting the winning free throws against Tennessee.

Some people may say it’s Houston now that it lost to Central Florida (and that would be a convenient excuse to move LSU up without having to deal with Kansas fans), but I’m not making that argument.  Although it was in December, the Cougars beat LSU.  I know the first reaction to Central Florida is “This isn’t football,” but they are a top-30 team according to the NET (Warren Nolan’s version anyway), which I guess is the new and improved RPI (which I was never a huge fan of because it gives teams a ton of credit for the games they lose).  I’ll grant that it’s late in the year to record a loss like that, but I don’t think Houston was exposed all of a sudden.  There is no reason to believe that’s a game Kansas or LSU couldn’t have lost in past couple of weeks.

Losses by Marquette and Nevada may also help LSU going forward, but like I talked about in the last blog, new things happen in basketball all the time, and my blog process isn’t that fast. I’d also note that Jerry Palm (whom I’ll mention later) now has LSU as a #2 with KU still a 4-seed.

I don’t think Lunardi is doing this intentionally and it may well be the same subconscious bias the committee holds, but I can’t help but think Kansas is getting some “blue blood” special treatment. 

Worst Loss

Normally I wouldn’t quibble too much about the worst lost, I’d just say both lost to a bad team and leave it at that.  But in this case, Oklahoma St. is 24 spots higher than West Virginia in the NET, and we have the benefit of them being in the same conference, so it’s not like the two have had vastly different opportunities. 

I think a good example of these teams is their respective February trips to Lubbock.  Texas Tech is a similar team to LSU, so I think that makes it a particularly good point of comparison (what the teams can do when they get up for a game).  Oklahoma St. took the Red Raiders to overtime while West Virginia lost by 31.  In Kansas’s defense, they did play the Mountaineers much closer than LSU played the Cowboys; but a bad loss in November means a lot less to me than one in mid-January. 

Oklahoma St.’s Lindy Waters’ hit four threes in the final minute, including the tying shot as time expired against Texas Tech; but the Cowboys fell in overtime.

When LSU lost to Oklahoma St., they were playing their third night in a row and just off a disappointing overtime loss to Florida St.  We may see in the SEC tournament if that third night in a row is the problem, but for sure the Tigers won’t be playing the day after a loss.  Also, the most you play in the NCAA tournament is twice in a week.

I started writing this on Friday, but it so happened the Cowboys also played Kansas close, so that furthers my argument, while on Saturday LSU got a slightly more impressive road win over Alabama.  I think beating teams in the NCAA field on the road is impressive even if they end up being 11 or 12 seeds. 

Let’s talk about the second-worst loss.  LSU’s was against Arkansas.  Absent winning the SEC tournament or at least winning 4 or 5 more games, Arkansas will not be an at-large team.  However, the Razorbacks just got a pretty decent win over Ole Miss for their 6^th win in conference play.  Also, if you throw Kansas a bone for only losing to West Virginia by 1, certainly it’s more understandable to lose to Arkansas by 1.

Other Losses

Kansas’s second-worst loss is slightly better, but Arizona St. just lost by 28 points to Oregon.  The Kansas-Arizona St. game was over two months ago, and Arizona St. is a higher-ranked team than Arkansas; but the disparity between Arizona St. and Arkansas is much less than that between Oklahoma St. and West Virginia. 

LSU’s other 3 losses are all against the NET top 30: (4) Houston, (23) Florida St., and (29) Florida.  Only one game in this group of losses (Florida, if you couldn’t guess) happened after December 12.

Kansas’s other losses: (5) Kentucky, (10) Texas Tech, (14) Iowa St., (28) Kansas St., and (36) Texas.  All the losses in this group have come since January 5.

Key Wins and Conclusion

According to Palm at CBS Sports, Kansas had two more “Quad 1” wins as of Friday morning.  Quad 1 wins consist of home games against the top 30, neutral games against the top 50, and road games against the top 75.  Since it was a road game, Alabama qualifies as a Quad 1 win, reducing the margin to 1.  Oklahoma St. is not in the top 75.

Although Alabama hit two late 3s, Tremont Waters (no relation to Lindy) led the Tigers to a 5-point victory in his first game back.

Kansas has the best non-conference strength of schedule in the nation, so a lot of these key wins took place before the new year, and as mentioned a lot of losses took place after.  I think analysis of the losses and when the games took place more than compensates for Kansas’s single additional Quad 1 win, and I hope Lunardi’s new projections give LSU the #3 ahead of Kansas.

Of course if LSU loses two (or more) of the next three games and Kansas wins out in the Big XII, Kansas will belong ahead; but I think it’s getting close enough to Selection Sunday that it’s a concern if you’re not giving teams proper credit for what they’ve done as of right now. 

Top 25 after Week 2

I do plan to write blogs other than rankings soon, but there weren’t a lot of extra days in the first two weeks. I posted the preseason rankings right before Week 1 started, and there were 5 playing days followed by the midweek Week 1 rankings. I’ll definitely have something to say about the upcoming LSU-Auburn game, possibly on Thursday.

I’m dropping Clemson because from what I saw they didn’t deserve to win. I’ll take a controversial close win over a major unranked team on the road if you’re #20 maybe, but not if you’re #2. Later in the season, it just counts as a win, but when we have relatively little information about the teams, you have to look at how they won.

If you didn’t see the game or highlights, Texas A&M came close to scoring the potentially tying touchdown in the last few minutes, but the ball was knocked loose. The ruling on the field was a touchback. Although from every angle, it looked like that was wrong, the call stood. I’ll elaborate in the next paragraph, but I’ll warn you it’s a bit of a rant.

I don’t think there is any way to create this image if the ball crossed the goal line before going out of bounds.

I don’t blame the referee if he simply couldn’t tell and made a guess, but the problem I have is that even if the referee has to flip a coin to decide, you have an incredible burden of proof to change the call. I wish there were an option where the referee could appeal directly to the replay booth if he didn’t see or couldn’t tell. Regardless, the call should have been overturned. Every angle shouldn’t have to be 100% clear. I don’t believe it’s possible that the ball went through the end zone. Never mind that this is the most completely unfair rule in football in the first place. If the ball goes out at your own 1, you keep it, but if you make it 99 yards down the field and you fumble forward (but not backward), it’s a turnover? Absurd.

Anyway, despite losing the ball in this ridiculous and unfair fashion, the Aggies were able to get the ball back and score a touchdown anyway. They just weren’t able to get the two-point conversion. Maybe Clemson would have played differently if they’d gotten the ball up 2 instead of 8 (assuming the same unsuccessful conversion play), but either way they would have wanted to hold onto the ball until the clock ran out. There is a very high chance that had the ruling been correct Texas A&M would have won.

I did make a rule for this week that you need to have a win over an FBS opponent from now on, so that explains some of the turnover of teams.

I also lowered Notre Dame a little bit for their close win over Ball St., who now has a 10-game losing streak against FBS opponents.

I indicated last week that Minnesota and Duke were playing for potential rankings, so I stuck to that. Iowa was ranked at the end of last year, and they just beat Iowa St., who was also ranked for much of last year, so I thought it made sense to put the Hawkeyes back. I mentioned Maryland looked good in Week 1 and despite some trouble early on, they won decisively. Arizona St. got in by beating Michigan St., although the Sun Devils’ offense needs work (as does Iowa’s). Virginia Tech and West Virginia haven’t really impressed me. I don’t think Florida St. and Tennessee (their respective Week 1 opponents) are very good, but the Hokies and Mountaineers were both teams I considered ranking before the season and have done nothing to deserve not being ranked.

The only other team that moved a lot was USC. They lost to a good team but didn’t make it very close or beat a very good team in Week 1, so 8 spots seems reasonable.

Stanford RB Bryce Love tries to pad his yardage against USC.. He ran for 136 yards for the game.

rank/team/prev.
1 Alabama 1
2 Georgia 3
3 Wisconsin 4
4 Ohio St. 5
5 Oklahoma 6
6 Stanford 7
7 Clemson 2
8 Auburn 8
9 Miss. St. 12
10 Boise St. 14
11 Notre Dame 9
12 UCF 16
13 LSU 17
14 Michigan 18
15 Penn St. 19
16 TCU 21
17 Okie St. 24
18 USC 10
19 Minnesota —
20 Iowa —
21 Maryland —
22 Arizona St. —
23 Duke —
24 Va. Tech —
25 W. Virginia —

Out of top 25: (11) Washington, (13) Florida, (15) Fresno St., (20) Mich. St., (22) Memphis, (23) S Carolina, (25) U. Miami

Week 7 Top 25 and Comments

I’ll talk about it more with my SEC Wednesday feature, but of course the big game was Texas A&M and Tennessee. Overtime is one of the ways you can be right but still get the spread wrong. They were exactly even through 60 minutes, so if you assume Tennessee has 6.5 extra points, picking Tennessee should be a win. What makes it even more annoying is that if Texas A&M had scored a touchdown to win in the first overtime (even if the Vols didn’t score at all), Tennessee would have still been the correct pick. Going even longer without being outscored only proved me more right, yet it made me wrong according to the bookies. I’m just glad I didn’t put actual money on it.

Anyway, I did pick the correct winner at least. Tennessee didn’t fall very far naturally because A&M on the road in overtime is the least-costly loss you can have right now and also because Tennessee had the most points going into the week. Still, I decided the fair thing to do was to move them below Ohio St. I think it’s too early for a team with a loss (despite the circumstances) to be in the top 5; but of course if they beat Alabama, they will be in the top 5 next week. Putting Alabama #1 and switching Tennessee with Ohio St. were the only changes I made from the computer. If Alabama wins, I expect them to be the natural #1, so maybe next week I can go without changing anything at all.

In one of the most amazing plays this season, Tennessee forced a fumble in the last moments just as it appeared Texas A&M was going to put the game away. The turnover led to the tying touchdown.

I don’t think 8-10 are that good, but the more credible teams keep losing or having bye weeks.

How the mighty have fallen when you realize Washington beat Oregon and got jumped by Ohio St., who beat… Indiana?

I know Florida St. has two losses, but they keep playing competitive opponents. I did make losses slightly less devastating this year, but it helpss that they’re not bad losses. Despite the margin of victory Louisville had, it just counts as one loss to a decent team.

rank/team/prev

1 Alabama 1
2 Michigan 3
3 Texas A&M 5
4 Clemson 4
5 Ohio St. 8
6 Tennessee 2
7 Washington 6
8 Boise St. 15
9 W. Michigan 11
10 Wake Forest 14
11 Penn St. —
12 Navy —
13 Houston 7
14 Arizona St. —
15 Florida St. —
16 Wisconsin 12
17 West Virginia 9
18 Virginia Tech 25
19 Stanford 13
20 Nebraska 16
21 Utah —
22 N. Carolina 17
23 Air Force 20
24 Louisville 24
25 Auburn —

Full 128

Out of rankings: (10) U. Miami, (18) Arkansas, (19) Florida, (21) Maryland, (22) Baylor, (23) Cal