Top 25 Update

How this weekend played out:
(teams that won crossed out, teams with impressive wins in green, teams with less than impressive wins in red)
update: actual rankings in parentheses -- I was within one for all of the top 17, but for only 3 of the next 17

 

Previous			Projected			My Rankings
1.	Florida		1.	Florida (1)		1.	Texas
2.	Texas		2.	Texas (3)		2.	Alabama
3.	Alabama		3.	Alabama (2)		3.	Florida
4.	TCU		4.	TCU (4)		4.	TCU
5.	Cincy		5.	Cincy (5)		5.	Cincy
6.	Boise St.		6.	Boise St. (6)		6.	Pitt
7.	GA Tech		7.	GA Tech (7)		7.	GA Tech
8.	Pitt		8.	Pitt (8)		8.	Ohio St.
9.	LSU		9.	Ohio St. (9)		9.	Oregon
10.	Ohio St.		10.	LSU (10)		10.	LSU
11.	USC		11.	Oregon (11)		11.	Boise St.
12.	Miami		12.	OK State (12)		12.	Iowa
13.	Houston		13.	Penn St. (13)		13.	Penn St.
14.	Oregon		14.	Stanford (14)		14.	Stanford
15.	Iowa		15.	VaTech (16)		15.	VaTech
16.	Utah		16.	Wisconsin (17)		16.	Wisconsin
17.	OK State		17.	Clemson (18)		17.	Oregon St.
18.	Arizona		18.	Iowa (15)		18.	Rutgers
19.	Penn St.		19.	Oregon St. (20)		19.	OK State
20.	VaTech		20.	USC (22)		20.	USC
21.	Wisconsin		21.	Rutgers (25)		21.	Clemson
22.	BYU		22.	Miami (21)		22.	Nebraska
23.	S. Florida		23.	Nebraska (27)		23.	UNC
24.	Clemson		24.	BYU (19)		24.	Miami
25.	Stanford		25.	UNC (26)		25.	Ole Miss
26.	Oregon St.		26.	Arizona (29)		26.	S. Florida
27.	W. Virginia		27.	Ole Miss (30)
28.	Auburn		28.	Navy (31)
29.	Texas Tech		29.	BC (38)
30.	Navy		30.	Utah (23)
31.	Tennessee		31.	Cal (28)
32.	Rutgers		32.	W. Virginia (35)
33.	Nebraska		33.	Houston (24)
			34.	S. Florida (NR)
			35.	Temple (32)

games between top 25 teams next week:

LSU at Ole Miss


other losable games for top 25 teams next week:

Ohio St. at Michigan
Duke at Miami
Oregon at Arizona
Minnesota at Iowa
Penn St. at Michigan St.
Wisconsin at Northwestern
Air Force at BYU
Cal at Stanford
UNC at BC
Kansas St. at Nebraska

other random thoughts:

-worst coaching move of the day goes to Kirk Ferentz of Iowa for running out the clock at the end of the game instead of trying to get into field goal position.  When your team is tied on the road against a top team, you have to take risks to win.  When his team had the ball within 40 yards of FG range with a minute on the clock he needed to make some sort of attempt to win the game.  Instead, he let it go into overtime and promptly lost.

-I don't know why that ball Jimmy Clausen tried to throw was ruled a fumble instead of an incomplete pass.  I've never seen a fumble propelled 8 yards forward by a QB's arm before.  The only possible explanation that I can think of is that he lost control of the ball before his arm moved forward (sure would've been nice if Musberger, Herbstreit, or somebody from the ABC crew had taken the time to figure out what the actual rule was during the review or the next two minutes of game time).

-I still stand by my prediction that TCU will emerge as the best non-BCS conference team by the end of the year

-Iowa has two losses and beat Wisconsin and Penn State, who both have two losses as well, on the road.  I'm betting the AP voters rank both ahead of Iowa anyway in this week's big rankings blunder.  Other head-to-head winners with identical records that will likely be ranked below the team they beat: UNC behind Miami, Cal behind Oregon, and South Florida behind West Virginia
update: Miami is, indeed, 5 spots ahead of UNC -- who continues to get little respect.  West Virginia is also ahead of South Florida, but Cal is one spot ahead of Arizona.  And, no, I don't think it's a travesty that Houston is behind Oklahoma St. since their records outside of that game are totally different.

another update:
underrated teams: Iowa, Rutgers, UNC, S. Florida
overrated teams: Boise St., OK State, BYU, Utah, Houston

Top 25 Update

How this weekend played out:
(teams that won crossed out, teams with impressive wins in green, teams with less than impressive wins in red)
update: actual rankings in parentheses, I was way off -- only came within one place on 15/34 teams.

Previous			Projected			My Rankings
1.	Florida		1.	Florida (1)		1.	Alabama
2.	Texas		2.	Alabama (3)		2.	Florida
3.	Alabama		3.	Texas (2)		3.	Texas
4.	Cincy		4.	Cincy (5)		4.	Cincy
5.	Boise St.		5.	TCU (4)		5.	TCU
6.	TCU		6.	Boise St. (6)		6.	Pitt
7.	Oregon		7.	GA Tech (7)		7.	GA Tech
8.	Iowa		8.	Oregon (16)		8.	Boise St.
9.	LSU		9.	USC (10)		9.	Oregon
10.	GA Tech		10.	Ohio St. (8)		10.	USC
11.	Penn St.		11.	Pitt (9)		11.	Ohio St.
12.	USC		12.	Iowa (13)		12.	Iowa
13.	Houston		13.	LSU (11)		13.	Penn St.
14.	Pitt		14.	Houston (12)		14.	LSU
15.	Ohio St.		15.	Miami (15)		15.	VaTech
16.	Miami		16.	Utah (14)		16.	Wisconsin
17.	Utah		17.	Okla St. (18)		17.	Arizona
18.	Okla St.		18.	Arizona (19)		18.	Miami
19.	Notre Dame		19.	Penn St. (17)		19.	S. Florida
20.	Oklahoma		20.	VaTech (21)		20.	Stanford
21.	Arizona		21.	Stanford (27)		21.	W. Virginia
22.	VaTech		22.	Wisconsin (20)		22.	Houston
23.	Cal		23.	Oregon St. (28)		23.	Oregon St.
24.	Wisconsin		24.	BYU (22)		24.	Okla St.
25.	BYU		25.	Nebraska (30)		25.	Rutgers
26.	S. Florida		26.	S. Florida (24)		26.	Clemson
27.	Clemson		27.	Clemson (26)
28.	Auburn		28.	Auburn (25)
29.	Texas Tech		29.	Texas Tech (29)
30.	W. Virginia		30.	W. Virginia (NR)
31.	Rutgers		31.	Rutgers (37)
			32.	UNC (34)
			33.	Navy (31)
			34.	Notre Dame (NR)

Games between top 25 teams next week:

Utah at TCU
Iowa at Ohio St.
Stanford at USC


Other losable games for top 25 teams:

Notre Dame at Pitt
Florida at S. Carolina
Cincy vs. W. Virginia
Texas Tech at OK St.
Arizona at Cal
Michigan at Wisconsin
Washington at Oregon St.
Miami at UNC


Other random thoughts

-I'm confident that the top four teams are legitimately top 10 teams, I'm somewhat convinced that TCU belongs, but past that I'm really not sure.  I'm not buying GA Tech, (who had another close win over a mediocre team) Boise St., (who had another close win over a below average team) or Pitt (who's schedule strength has been less than impressive) as legitimate top 10 teams at this point in time.  And USC, Oregon, Ohio St., and Iowa seem to alternate between impressive and unimpressive victories on a weekly basis.

-It's hard to believe that Oregon will only drop one spot in the rankings after losing to Stanford, but they can't drop below USC, who can't drop below Ohio St.  And how many teams can jump all three?
update: Apparently they can.  Oregon trounced USC, who beat Ohio St. on the road.  All three have identical records and pretty similar wins/losses outside of those games.  But Ohio St. is #8, USC is #10, and Oregon is #16.  Huh?