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2016 TipTop 25 Week Seven

Welcome back 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 UNLV was selected first, thereby securing our preseason #1 slot, but in week two they were drubbed 42-21 at previously unranked UCLA, ending their brief stay at the top.

As the games are played, I am also ranking teams completely blind to their histories and "name" value, so that they are ranked solely based on what they do this season and, for now at least, on where they were 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.

Ohio State Remains #1

Ohio State started the season ranked #37. However, after demolishing #18 Bowling Green 77-10 in their opener, they shot up the rankings to #12, and after routing #9 Tulsa 48-3 in week two, they moved up to #3. Finally, in week five, #1 Louisville lost at Clemson and #2 Michigan edged previously-unrated Wisconsin by only 7 points at home, clearing the way for Ohio State to move to the top of the rankings. This week the Buckeyes needed overtime to survive at #13 Wisconsin, matching Michigan's one struggle, and with 7-0 Alabama winning 49-10 at #8 Tennessee, OSU's grip on #1 is now rather tenuous. For now we're keeping OSU on the throne, but Alabama is playing #5 Texas A&M on Saturday, and a win by any score will surely put the Tide on top.

Top 25 After Week Seven Games

Things are calming down in our top 25 now. This week, a season-low 5 teams in our top 25 took upset losses, one fewer than we saw last week. Furthermore, this is the first week that no new teams enter the rankings. This week's TipTop 25 is as follows:

	Team	Record	LW	This Week's Result
#1	Ohio State	6-0	1	Won 30-23 in overtime at #13 Wisconsin
#2	Michigan	6-0	2	Did not play
#3	Alabama	7-0	9	Won 49-10 at #8 Tennessee
#4	Washington	6-0	3	Did not play
#5	Texas A&M	6-0	4	Did not play
#6	Clemson	7-0	5	Won 24-17 in overtime over North Carolina State
#7	Louisville	5-1	6	Won 24-14 over Duke
#8	Baylor	6-0	7	Won 49-7 over Kansas
#9	Tennessee	5-2	8	Lost 49-10 to #9 Alabama (now #3)
#10	Auburn	4-2	10	Did not play
#11	Western Michigan	7-0	11	Won 41-0 at Akron
#12	Wisconsin	4-2	13	Lost 30-23 in overtime to #1 Ohio State
#13	Arkansas	5-2	22	Won 34-30 over #16 Mississippi
#14	Nebraska	6-0	14	Won 27-22 at Indiana
#15	Mississippi	3-3	16	Lost 34-30 at #22 Arkansas (now #13)
#16	Memphis	5-1	18	Won 24-14 at Tulane
#17	Louisiana State	4-2	30	Won 45-10 over Southern Miss
#18	Troy	5-1	12	Won 31-21 over Georgia State
#19	Boise State	6-0	17	Won 28-23 over Colorado State
#20	Navy	4-1	20	Did not play
#21	Houston	6-1	21	Won 38-31 over #23 Tulsa
#22	Tulsa	4-2	23	Lost 38-31 at #21 Houston
#23	Oklahoma	4-2	24	Won 38-17 over Kansas State
#24	West Virginia	5-0	25	Won 48-17 at Texas Tech
#25	Virginia Tech	4-2	15	Lost 31-17 at Syracuse

Notes on Changes to This Week's Top 25

Although no new teams enter this week's top 25 for the first time this year, Virginia Tech came very close to falling out after their 2-touchdown loss at unrated Syracuse. They held on to the last spot in the top 25 because North Carolina, whom they crushed 34-3 the week before, is #26.

Troy won this week, but they still dropped from #12 to #18. The only reason they had been ranked to begin with was because they gave Clemson (#6) a tough game, losing just 30-24 on the road early in the season. However, though they've won the rest of their games, that close loss is still their only "accomplishment," and it becomes less impressive this week thanks to Clemson being taken to overtime by unrated North Carolina State. That's Clemson's 4th close win, so playing the Tigers close no longer seems very special. Furthermore, Troy's 37-31 win over Southern Miss, also early in the season, looks pretty bad now that Louisiana State has beaten USM 45-10 this week.

In fact, given that superior performance, I moved LSU up into the top 25, ahead of Troy in the rankings. LSU's only losses have come in close games at #10 Auburn and at #12 Wisconsin, so putting them at #17 seems more appropriate than where they had been, which was #30.

Close to the Top 25

The following teams are next in line to be ranked:

#26 North Carolina
#27 Florida State
#28 Miami (Florida)
#29 Texas Christian
#30 Florida
#31 South Florida
#32 San Diego State
#33 Utah

Looking Ahead to Next Week's Games

We have a lot of action amongst our top 25 teams this week:

#5 Texas A&M at #3 Alabama
#13 Arkansas at #10 Auburn
#15 Mississippi at #17 Louisiana State
#16 Memphis at #20 Navy

On top of all that, we have #29 Texas Christian at #24 West Virginia, #28 Miami (Florida) at #25 Virginia Tech, 4-2 North Carolina State at #7 Louisville, 5-2 Eastern Michigan at #11 Western Michigan, and #12 Wisconsin at 5-2 Iowa.

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