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2017 TipTop 25 Week Three

 Clemson is the first school picked at random from my hat

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 Clemson was selected first, thereby securing our preseason #1 slot, and after a big 14-6 win over #3 Auburn in week 2, followed by a 47-21 win over #18 Louisville this week, they easily remain #1.

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 teams were ranked in the preseason should have little or no impact on their current rankings.

All unranked 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.

TipTop 25 After Week Three Games

Only 4 of our top 25 teams from last week took upset losses, but there is still a huge shake-up in the rankings this week because 3 of our top 10 teams posted close wins over unranked opponents. This week's TipTop 25 is as follows:
Team Record LW This Week's Result
#1 Clemson 3-0 1 Won 47-21 over #18 Louisville (now unrated)
#2 Auburn 2-1 3 Won 24-10 over an FCS team
#3 Washington 3-0 6 Won 48-16 over Fresno State
#4 Wisconsin 3-0 5 Won 40-6 at Brigham Young
#5 Georgia 3-0 9 Won 42-14 over an FCS team
#6 Notre Dame 2-1 11 Won 49-20 at Boston College
#7 Central Florida 1-0 13 Did not play
#8 Michigan 3-0 14 Won 29-13 over Air Force
#9 Houston 2-0 16 Won 38-3 over Rice
#10 Arizona 2-1 17 Won 63-16 at UTEP
#11 Colorado 3-0 22 Won 41-21 over an FCS team
#12 Wake Forest 3-0 23 Won 46-10 over Utah State
#13 Miami (Florida) 1-0 25 Did not play
#14 Oklahoma 3-0 26 Won 56-14 over Tulane
#15 Oklahoma State 3-0 27 Won 59-21 at Pittsburgh
#16 Minnesota 3-0 31 Won 34-3 over Middle Tennessee
#17 Maryland 2-0 Unrated Did not play
#18 Toledo 3-0 8 Won 54-51 over Tulsa
#19 Southern Cal 3-0 10 Won 27-24 in overtime over Texas
#20 San Diego State 3-0 34 Won 20-17 over Stanford
#21 Texas Tech 2-0 4 Won 52-45 over Arizona State
#22 Oregon 3-0 12 Won 49-13 at Wyoming
#23 Iowa 3-0 21 Won 31-14 over North Texas
#24 Vanderbilt 3-0 Unrated Won 14-7 over #7 Kansas State (now unrated)
#25 Virginia Tech 3-0 30 Won 64-17 at East Carolina

Notes on Changes to This Week's TipTop 25

Three highly-ranked teams dropped due to close wins over unranked opponents (#18 Toledo, #19 Southern Cal, and #21 Texas Tech). Oregon also dropped, from #12 to #22, not because they had a close win this week, but because they posted a close win over Nebraska last week. That was fine while Nebraska was ranked, but this week Nebraska was knocked out of the rankings due to losing to unranked Northern Illinois, so now Oregon's close win over Nebraska hurts them rather than helps.

With only 3 weeks of games to judge by, the value of comparative scores is magnified. Maryland is now ranked higher than Southern Cal because they did better against Texas, and San Diego State is now ranked higher than Texas Tech because they did better against Arizona State.

3-0 Cal beat previous #2 Mississippi this week, but Cal doesn't make the ratings because their first 2 outings were weak, and they did worse against North Carolina than #27 Louisville did.

Close to the Top 25

The following teams are next in line to be ranked:

#26 Kansas State
#27 Louisville
#28 Iowa State
#29 California

Also, the following teams have each won all of their games by more than a touchdown, and bear watching: Alabama, Penn State, Michigan State, South Florida, Duke, Mississippi State, and Texas Christian. 5 of these 7 teams play ranked opponents for the first time this week, so opportunity is knocking.

Looking Ahead to Next Week's Games

We have a lot of great games this week, which will no doubt lead to another big shake-up in the TipTop 25. The headliner games are #3 Washington at #11 Colorado, #7 Central Florida at #17 Maryland, #21 Texas Tech at #9 Houston, and #18 Toledo at #13 Miami (Florida). On top of that, we have #19 Southern Cal at #29 Cal. And then we have 5 ranked teams playing unbeaten opponents that may be unranked, but have won every game by more than a touchdown so far: #5 Georgia hosting Mississippi State, #6 Notre Dame at Michigan State, #15 Oklahoma State hosting Texas Christian, #23 Iowa hosting Penn State, and #24 Vanderbilt hosting Alabama.

Join me next week as we continue to hone the top 25 that was born from my magic hat.

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