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2019 TipTop 25 Week Five

Georgia Southern is picked first out of my hat for 2019

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 Georgia Southern was selected first, thereby securing our preseason #1 slot, but they lost their opener 55-3 at previously unranked Louisiana State, so their stay at the top was brief.

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 (and on where their opponents 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.

We Have a New #1

MS Paint of an Ohio State player

We have a new #1 this week, and as the MS Paint portrait above serves to indicate, it is Ohio State! I pulled the Buckeyes out of my hat for the #41 slot in the preseason, and they've been working their way upward every week since then. In their opener, they defeated #44 Florida Atlantic 45-21 and moved up the list to #27. The next week, they blasted #25 Cincinnati 42-0, sending them up to #16. Then they stomped on #38 Indiana 51-10, on the road no less, and rose to #11. Next up was a 76-5 annihilation of unranked Miami (Ohio), and due to the struggles of teams ranked ahead of them that week, the Buckeyes found themselves ranked #5.

This week, the Buckeyes again annihilated an unranked team, 48-7 at Nebraska, and again the teams ranked ahead of them have struggled, enabling Ohio State to rise to #1. Our previous #1, Navy, lost 35-23 at Memphis, #2 Wisconsin only won 24-15 over a bad Northwestern team (not nearly a good enough performance for a #1 team, or even top 10), #3 Kansas State lost 26-13 at Oklahoma State, and #4 Mississippi State was embarrassed 56-23 at Auburn. Hello Columbus!

TipTop 25 After Week Five Games

Last week, our top 25 teams had suffered just 3 upset losses, an unusually low amount for that point in the season, but this week we're back up to 5, and 3 of those losses were taken by our top 4 teams! Needless to say, that gives us another big shakeup in the ratings. This week's TipTop 25 is as follows:

Team Record LW This Week's Result
#1 Ohio State 5-0 5
 Won 48-7 at unrated Nebraska
#2 Louisiana State 4-0 6
 Did not play
#3 Texas 3-1 10
 Did not play
#4 Oklahoma State 4-1 12
 Won 26-13 over #3 Kansas State (now #22)
#5 Auburn 5-0 7 Won 56-23 over unrated Mississippi State
#6 Oregon 3-1 8
 Did not play
#7 Georgia 4-0 9 Did not play
#8 Notre Dame
 3-1 11
 Won 35-20 over #15 Virginia (now #23)
#9 Wisconsin 4-0 2 Won 24-15 over unrated Northwestern
#10 Penn State
 4-0 13 Won 59-0 at unrated Maryland
#11 Oklahoma 4-0 18 Won 55-16 over unrated Texas Tech
#12 Alabama
 5-0 20 Won 59-31 over unrated Mississippi
#13 Memphis 4-0 Unrated
 Won 35-23 over #1 Navy (now #14)
#14 Navy 2-1 1
 Lost 35-23 at unrated Memphis (now #13)
#15 Boise State 4-0 14
 Did not play
#16 Clemson 5-0 19 Won 21-20 at unrated North Carolina
#17 Appalachian State 4-0
 21 Won 56-37 over unrated Coastal Carolina
#18 Iowa 4-0 24
 Won 48-3 over unrated Middle Tennessee
#19 Baylor 4-0 Unrated Won 23-21 over #25 Iowa State (now #20)
#20 Iowa State
 2-2 25 Lost 23-21 at unrated Baylor (now #19)
#21 Michigan 3-1 Unrated Won 52-0 over unrated Rutgers
#22 Kansas State 3-1 3 Lost 26-13 at #12 Oklahoma State (now #4)
#23 Virginia 4-1 15 Lost 35-20 at #11 Notre Dame (now #8)
#24 Wake Forest
5-0 16 Won 27-24 at unrated Boston College
#25 Utah State 3-1 17 Won 34-24 over unrated Colorado State

Notes on Changes to This Week's TipTop 25

Due to their big road win over now-#3 Texas earlier in the season, LSU was a contender for the #1 slot this week, but Ohio State has been perfect, they've beaten 3 teams that were top 50 at the time, and they were ranked #41 in the preseason, while LSU was not ranked in the top 50, so I'm going with the Buckeyes for now.

Boise State has been passed up by a few teams this week, primarily because they have 2 close wins over opponents who are no longer even close to ranked. They likely wouldn't be rated at all if they hadn't been selected from my hat for the #6 spot in the preseason.

Michigan has returned to the top 25 due to the fact that a bunch of ranked teams now have poor performances, and the Wolverines were #14 in the preseason.

Utah State falls not just because of a lackluster 10 point home win over unrated Colorado State, but mostly because Wake Forest, who has previously beaten Utah State, won by only 3 points at unrated Boston College, sending the Demon Deacons falling down the list.

Close to the Top 25

The following teams are next in line to be ranked:

#26 Florida
#27 Air Force
#28 Colorado
#29 Arizona State
#30 Michigan State
#31 California
#32 Washington

Looking Ahead to Next Week's Games

For the second week in a row, we have 3 games pitting top 25 teams against each other:#25 Utah State at #2 Louisiana State, #18 Iowa at #21 Michigan, and #19 Baylor at #22 Kansas State. In addition, #1 Ohio State hosts #30 Michigan State, #5 Auburn visits #26 Florida, #6 Oregon plays #31 California, and #14 Navy faces #27 Air Force. Note that #1 Ohio State and #2 Louisiana State face similarly ranked opponents next week, so if OSU struggles and LSU wins big, we could have a new #1. We shall see. Join me next week as we continue to hone the top 25 that was born from my magic hat.

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