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2019 TipTop 25 Week Six

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.

Ohio State Still #1

MS Paint of an Ohio State player

I pulled the Buckeyes out of my hat for the #41 slot in the preseason, and then they methodically worked their way upward week after week. 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.

Last week, the Buckeyes again annihilated an unranked team, 48-7 at Nebraska, and again the teams ranked ahead of them 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. This week OSU demolished #30 Michigan State 34-10.

TipTop 25 After Week Six Games

Last week, our top 25 teams had suffered 5 upset losses, but this week the top 25 took just 3 upset losses, and one of those was #18 Iowa losing a close one at #21 Michigan. As a result, we are seeing the least amount of movement in the new top 25 rankings than we have seen thus far this season. This week's TipTop 25 is as follows:

Team Record LW This Week's Result
#1 Ohio State 6-0 1
 Won 34-10 over #30 Michigan State
#2 Louisiana State 5-0 2
 Won 42-6 over #25 Utah State
#3 Georgia 5-0 7
 Won 43-14 at unrated Tennessee
#4 Notre Dame
 4-1 8
 Won 52-0 over unrated Bowling Green
#5 Florida 6-0 26 Won 24-13 over #5 Auburn (now #6)
#6 Auburn 5-1 5
 Lost 24-13 at #26 Florida (now #5)
#7 Wisconsin 5-0 9 Won 48-0 over unrated Kent State
#8 Oregon 4-1 6
 Won 17-7 over #31 California
#9 Penn State 5-0 10 Won 35-7 over unrated Purdue
#10 Oklahoma 5-0 11 Won 45-20 at unrated Kansas
#11 Texas 4-1 3
 Won 42-31 at unrated West Virginia
#12 Alabama
 5-0 12 Did not play
#13 Memphis 5-0 13
 Won 52-33 at unrated Louisiana Monroe
#14 Navy 3-1 14
 Won 34-25 over #27 Air Force
#15 Boise State 5-0 15
 Won 38-13 at unrated UNLV
#16 Clemson 5-0 16 Did not play
#17 Appalachian State 4-0
 17 Did not play
#18 Michigan 4-1 21
 Won 10-3 over #18 Iowa (now #19)
#19 Iowa 4-1 18 Lost 10-3 at #21 Michigan (now #18)
#20 Baylor 5-0 19 Won 31-12 at #22 Kansas State (now unrated)
#21 Iowa State 3-2 20 Won 49-24 over unrated Texas Christian
#22 Virginia 4-1 23 Did not play
#23 Wake Forest 5-0 24 Did not play
#24 Utah State 3-2 25 Lost 42-6 at #2 Louisiana State
#25 Cincinnati 4-1 Unrated Won 27-24 over unrated Central Florida

Notes on Changes to This Week's TipTop 25

Oklahoma State had been #4 last week, but their big loss at unrated Texas Tech this week throws them out of the rankings. Texas, #3 last week, is affected by that loss as well, as they had only beaten Oklahoma State by 6 at home earlier in the season. The Longhorns fall to #11.

I moved Wisconsin past Oregon because they have performed more impressively, and Oregon's close loss to Auburn is not looking as strong now that Auburn has been beaten 24-13 at Florida. Auburn remains ranked ahead of Wisconsin primarily because they were ranked #13 in the preseason (Oregon was not ranked in the preseason top 50).

Cincinnati returns to the top 25 for the first time since Ohio State knocked them out with a 42-0 beatdown in week 2. The Bearcats make this week's list mostly because pickins are slim at this point. In fact, those slim pickins are also why Utah State remains ranked despite being smashed 42-6 at #2 LSU this week.

Close to the Top 25

As I said, pickins are slim. I'm just going to list 3 teams here this week:

#26 Texas A&M
#27 Southern Methodist
#28 Minnesota

Looking Ahead to Next Week's Games

For the third week in a row, we have 3 games pitting top 25 teams against each other: #5 Florida at #2 Louisiana State, #9 Penn State at #19 Iowa, and #10 Oklahoma facing #11 Texas in Dallas. In addition, #12 Alabama visits #26 Texas A&M. Join me next week as we continue to hone the top 25 that was born from my magic hat.

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