The week’s top winners and losers, picking the six teams that collectively had the best and worst Saturdays.
Winners:
Oklahoma State: One half of nearly flawless football kept Ok State in the winner’s column and out of the loser’s. How often can your star player fumble a touchdown out of the endzone and you still win the game? Oh yeah, that was playing on the road against a top 10 conference rival. Bravo, Cowboys. Bravo.
LSU: Like most people I had a hard time decided between Alabama and LSU for the top team in the country this week. Hell, I had Alabama in my winners in the first draft. Alabama had a spectacular game at home against a conference rival that we really didn’t know much about. LSU went on the road against a hungry team that desperately wants to be future conference rival in primetime. LSU smoked them in every way possible. LSU vs. Bama is going to be fun.
Arizona State: Meet the new leader in the Pac-12 South. It just feels good to type that so I can only imagine how great the ASU team and fans are feeling. After dropping the ball against Illinois, ASU is on top of the Pac-12 South and have just cleared a path for themselves to the first Pac-12 title game.
Losers:
Maryland: The ugly uniforms were cool when you beat Miami on ESPN. When you get steamrolled by Temple at home… well ugly refers to more than the uniforms. I’m sure Ralph Friedgen is laughing somewhere.
Florida State: Maybe Clemson is much better than people think but this has to be a huge let down for FSU. Top 5 to barely top 25 in two weeks is rough. Guess we’ll be subjected to more “Is FSU finally back?” stories next preseason too. (3 years in a row now or has it been more?)
Toledo: Toledo fans meet Cubs fans. I have a feeling you’ll get along. If Toledo misses a bowl game this year they might lay seige to Syracuse and the Big East officials.
Still pondering the winners and losers this week but please enjoy the BMB Top 25 for now. Positions 11-25 are getting harder to fill out as the conference schedule kicks off for most teams. It should get easier with each week though.
- LSU
- Alabama
- Oklahoma
- Boise St
- Oklahoma St
- Wisconsin
- Stanford
- Nebraska
- Oregon
- Florida
- South Carolina
- Clemson
- Virginia Tech
- Texas A&M
- Baylor
- South Florida
- Arkansas
- Illinois
- Texas
- Georgia Tech
- TCU
- West Va
- Arizona State
- Michigan
- Florida State
It was a tough choice between LSU and Bama but I think LSU has shown more and they’ve done it on the road. With an impressive win this weekend over Florida, Alabama may move into the top slot though. After that, who knows? Bama and LSU as the top two teams in the country is the only certainty at this point.
In the past 3 seasons Oregon is 2-3 against ranked non-conference opponents beating Utah and Oklahoma State while losing to Boise State, Ohio State, and Auburn.
In the past 3 seasons Boise State is 6-1 against ranked non-conference opponents beating Utah, Virginia Tech, Oregon State, TCU, and Oregon (twice!) while losing to TCU by 1 point.
In that same period Boise State has played in 1 BCS bowl with a victory while Oregon has played in 2 with 2 losses.
2011 Preseason rankings had Oregon @ #3 and Boise State @ #5.
Saturday night both teams played at “neutral sites” against SEC opponents. Boise traveled to Atlanta to play Georgia while Oregon traveled to Dallas to play LSU. The Broncos won big and the Ducks lost big so let’s update:
In the past 3 seasons Oregon is 2-4 against ranked non-conference opponents beating Utah and Oklahoma State while losing to Boise State, Ohio State, Auburn, and LSU.
In the past 3 seasons Boise State is 7-1 against ranked non-conference opponents beating Georgia, Utah, Virginia Tech, Oregon State, TCU, and Oregon (twice!) while losing to TCU by 1 point.
I think it’s time the media start giving “SEC-like” credibility to Boise State and “Ohio State-like” credibility to Oregon. By this I mean that you almost never see the media pick an SEC school to lose a non-conference game (BSU was favored by 3 Saturday night against a Georgia team coming off a losing record) because they are that flippin’ good and almost always win. Likewise you’ll never hear the media call Ohio State a bad team but they’ll never get favored in a large non-conference game because the Buckeyes earned it by losing 3 straight BCS games and shitting the bed twice against USC. Both OSU and the SEC have earned their reputation and unless results prove otherwise, they deserve to hold that reputation.
A 0.875 winning percentage against ranked non-conference opponents needs to be respected more than a 0.333 winning percentage. How many times have you seen Boise’s coach on College Game day or in a Sports Center commercial? Chip Kelly will soon be a co-host at his rate. Oregon may have new uniforms every week to compliment their flashy and unique offensive scheme but they also don’t produce at the top 5 status they are given.
Go Broncos!
P.S.
This “neutral site” shit with Boise State has to go. According to Google Maps: Boise to Atlanta = 2,100 miles. Athens to Atlanta = 70 miles. Boise to DC = 2,300 miles, Blacksburg to DC = 300 miles. By way of analogy, the size of my dick is “neutral” compared to Ron Jeremy. Ladies feel free to email me. [Ladies, Dan can be contacted here. -Z]
