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2015 TipTop 25 Week Seven

Welcome back again to the college football ranking system that began with a preseason top 25 that was based solely on picking teams at random out of a hat, as shown above. You can see that Duke was selected first, thereby securing our preseason #1 slot, but they lost in week 3 to Northwestern, and currently they are 5-1 and ranked #15.

As the games are played, I am ranking teams completely blind to their histories and "name" value, so that they are ranked solely based on what they do this season and, to a lesser degree each week, on where they were randomly ranked in the preseason. Eventually, where they were ranked in the preseason should have little or no impact on their current rankings.

All FBS teams are treated the same here, but this ranking assumes that FCS teams are a level below, and therefore it is unacceptable for a ranked FBS team to struggle with an FCS team, let alone lose. On the other hand, beating an FCS team, regardless of how "impressive" the score, means nothing and is treated the same as though the winner did not play a game at all.

Utah Still #1

I pulled Utah out of my hat for the #17 slot in the preseason, and they got off to a great start when they defeated #15 Michigan 24-17 in the first week. Michigan is now 5-2 and ranked #10. Utah has also beaten #12 California (5-1). Those are their only close wins. This week they won 34-18 over 4-3 Arizona State, who had been rated #33 last week (now unrated).

Top 25 After Games of Week Seven

Last week 4 of our top 25 teams were upset, and this week was pretty similar, with 5 of our top 25 teams taking a loss to a lower-ranked team. But only 3 new teams arrive in this week's list. This week's TipTop 25 is as follows:

	Team	Record	LW	This Week's Result
#1	Utah	6-0	1	Won 34-18 over previously #33 Arizona State
#2	Baylor	6-0	3	Won 62-38 over unrated West Virginia
#3	Clemson	6-0	7	Won 34-17 over unrated Boston College
#4	Iowa	7-0	17	Won 40-10 at #13 Northwestern
#5	Louisiana State	6-0	16	Won 35-28 over #11 Florida
#6	Texas Christian	7-0	5	Won 45-21 at unrated Iowa State
#7	Notre Dame	6-1	11	Won 41-31 over previously #32 Southern Cal
#8	Florida State	6-0	8	Won 41-21 over unrated Louisville
#9	Michigan State	7-0	29	Won 27-23 at #10 Michigan
#10	Michigan	5-2	2	Lost 27-23 to #9 Michigan State
#11	Florida	6-1	12	Lost 35-28 at #5 Louisiana State
#12	California	5-1	9	Off
#13	Northwestern	5-2	4	Lost 40-10 to #4 Iowa
#14	Stanford	5-1	6	Won 56-35 over previously #34 UCLA
#15	Duke	5-1	10	Off
#16	Memphis	6-0	28	Won 37-24 over #22 Mississippi
#17	Ohio State	7-0	19	Won 38-10 over #29 Penn State
#18	Houston	6-0	20	Won 42-7 at unrated Tulane
#19	Temple	6-0	21	Won 30-16 over unrated Central Florida
#20	Toledo	6-0	24	Won 63-20 over unrated Eastern Michigan
#21	Oklahoma State	6-0	18	Off
#22	Mississippi	5-2	13	Lost 37-24 at #16 Memphis
#23	Alabama	6-1	14	Won 41-23 at #24 Texas A&M
#24	Texas A&M	5-1	15	Lost 41-23 to #23 Alabama
#25	Mississippi State	5-2	26	Won 45-20 over unrated Louisiana Tech

Notes on Changes to This Week's Top 25

I do not rate teams the way the AP poll does, so a team's movement up or down is not just based on winning or losing their latest game. It's also based on how they've performed (a close win over an unrated opponent is a poor performance), and on how the teams they've previously played have done this week.

Northwestern has been blown out 2 weeks in a row, but they are still ranked #13. Why? Because they have beaten #14 Stanford (5-1) and #15 Duke (5-1), and they have taken their losses to highly-ranked opponents (#4 Iowa and #10 Michigan). There isn't much room for them to drop until they lose to a mediocre team, or until Stanford and Duke start losing too.

TCU had been ranked #5 last week, and 2 teams rated ahead of them lost, but they actually drop a spot this week, and 3 teams pass them up, even though they won big this week. What happened? Well, one of their close wins earlier this season came over Minnesota, who was beaten by a mediocre Nebraska this week, and another of TCU's close wins came over Kansas State, who lost 55-0 to Oklahoma this week.

Close to the Top 25

The following teams are next in line to be ranked: Texas Tech, Wisconsin, Navy, Penn State, Appalachian State, Auburn, Kentucky, and Pittsburgh.

Kentucky plays at #25 Mississippi State this week, which could be their chance to slip into the top 25.

Looking Ahead to Next Week's Games

Terrible slate of games for our top 25 this week. There is only one matchup of rated teams, #24 Texas A&M at #22 Mississippi. Join me next week as we continue to hone the top 25 that was born from my magic hat.

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