First off, to those of you who were treating last week's Duke loss as a win, I hope you count this week's loss as 2 losses.... ;-)
PerryScope's ballot looks pretty good to me. I've got Stanford as my #1 one-loss team. I think they can beat anyone. I'm going to make Utah my #2 one-loss team. I agree of keeping Iowa out of the top 10. Their schedule is simply awful and I can't reward that. I, for some reason, watched most of the Florida - Vandy game and that was some truly god awful football. After watching more SEC this year than I usually do, I actually respect SEC fans more... anyone who shows up week after week for that crappy football is a real fan.
Side note. That was a pretty miserable few hours in Autzen on Saturday night but at least it didn't rain much.
Nick Kranz:
Finally, some upsets to shake up the polls and make this exercise significantly more interesting than most of the past few weeks!
As fiatlux notes, Duke solved whatever quandary was created two weeks ago by getting stomped this week, so one less potential headache in this week's poll.
Other thoughts....
1. Baylor: So, my basis for keeping Baylor in my top 4 is entirely based upon their margin of victory. Obviously their strength of schedule is currently horrible, with a best win over . . . Texas Tech? Iowa State? They've only faced one remotely difficult road trip, and they had to escape against 3-5 Kansas State. They look more vulnerable without Seth Russell. With other teams (Oklahoma State, Alabama) picking up high value wins, Baylor falls to 5th in my poll. Their stay in that spot will likely be short, because they'll either move back into the top 4 or out of the top 10 entirely depending on next week's result vs. Oklahoma.
2. What to do with Memphis, Temple, and Navy? I've got them going 13-Navy, 14-Temple, 18-Memphis. Temple and Memphis were both hurt because their best wins (Penn St. and Ole Miss) both took losses. But Navy and Temple both stay relatively high because their only loss (Notre Dame) keeps cruising along.
3. I was about to rank Mississippi State out of rote habit, but glanced at their schedule. The Bulldogs have two very understandable losses (by 2 points LSU and away against Texas A&M) but their best win is . . . at auburn? At home vs. Kentucky? Nah, that's not enough.
4. How far to drop Michigan St. and TCU? Both teams have had a combination of weak schedules and games that were too close considering the competition, so it was mostly being undefeated that kept their resumes afloat. Without that factor, I dropped them into the mid teens.
5. What to do with North Carolina? They haven't played anybody impressive, but most of their wins have been by dominant score lines, and their closest games have been against most OK teams on the road. They're probably going to cruise into the ACC championship game with one loss. I dunno.
fiatlux:
Good point about Miss State, Nick... oh wait a second, I think I made that point last week!
BTW, I would love to see Stanford and Utah win out because that would basically guarantee a Pac12 team in the final four, when just two weeks ago so many were discounting that.
atomsareenough:
Stop the presses! Noted Golden Bear fan and former Cal Mic Man fiatlux intends to root for Stanford in the Big Game!
fiatlux:
Whoops... I didn't quite think that one through..... I'll call it hangover from trip to Eugene.
Berkelium97:
After I complained last week about how these ballots were getting tedious because the undefeated teams weren't playing anyone, we finally get a week that shuffles the ballots!
I've been critical of Oklahoma State for their fortunate wins in Big 12 play, but I'm rewarding them with a dominant win over a good TCU team. That win gives them a stronger resume than Baylor and Ohio State, so they climb ahead of them this week.
We're far enough into the season that the one-loss teams are consistently climbing past the questionable undefeated P5 teams. Iowa is the big loser this week, as their 9-0 record isn't enough to hold off the strongest one-loss teams.
Bowling Green makes its debut in my ballot mostly behind Matt Johnson's ridiculous quarterbacking. He is averaging a stellar 9.7 yards per passing attempt with 33 TDs, 3 interceptions, and a whopping 410 yards per game. With four games remaining this season (assuming BGSU wins one more game to get to the MAC Championship Game), he's on pace to throw for over 5,700 yards. He has officially replaced Western Kentucky's Brandon Doughty as the best QB no one has ever heard of.
atomsareenough:
Okay, odds and ends... Everyone had Clemson #1 this week. Berkelium and I had the exact same teams on our ballots, and they were mostly in very similar spots. We only had 5 voters this week, as apparently ragnarok and mpeters10 weren't available. I was pretty busy this week too, so I understand. Fiatlux voted for Wisconsin twice, so I took his higher vote and ended up not counting anything for his #25 spot. I caught it late, otherwise I would have gone back and asked for a new team. Sorry fiatlux! It didn't end up affecting anything, though.
Really this was the most cohesive ballot so far. Lots of agreement overall. I think we're starting to agree which teams are the best, finally.
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