Occasional musings too long to fit in my facebook status updates

Monday, October 15, 2007

overrated/underrated college football teams

With the first BCS poll of the year being released, it becomes easier to see which teams might be overrated or underrated. In the past I've noticed that the computer rankings more accurately reflected a team's prowess than did human rankings. This occurs for various reasons and is, of course, not always true. Given that the season is only about half over it's still difficult to tell how good most teams actually are. The lists that follow are of teams that are ranked notably higher or lower by the computer polls than they are by the human polls. The team's AP and Computer rankings are in parentheses after the school's name and they're under a heading trying to explain the discrepancy.

Overrated b/c they haven't beaten any top teams:
Ohio State (1/5)
Boston College (3/7)
Oklahoma (4/11) -- That Miami win no longer looks so impressive.
Oregon (7/13) -- I think they've gotten credit for almost beating Cal, a team the computers don't particularly like. They could rise if Michigan keeps winning.
USC (13/23) -- That Nebraska win no longer looks so impressive.
Florida (14/17) -- moved down in this week's human polls to narrow the gap
Hawaii (17/25)
Texas (19/unrated) -- 27 teams have at least a percentage of the vote by the computers, Texas is not one of them (meaning the computers view them as no better than the 28th best team).
Texas Tech (22/unrated)

Underrated b/c they started low in the polls:
Kentucky (8/4) -- An inexplicable 13th in the coaches' poll
Virginia (27/14)

Underrated b/c the computers consider 0 losses more impressive than do the humans:
Arizona State (12/5)
Kansas (15/8)

Underrated b/c of a tough schedule:
Auburn (18/12)

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Buffalo, New York, United States