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2019 TipTop 25 Week Eight

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

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.

The next week, Ohio State again annihilated an unranked team, 48-7 at Nebraska, and again the teams ranked ahead of them struggled, enabling OSU to rise all the way 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. OSU has been #1 since then, but there has been tremendous pressure on them from below in recent weeks.

That pressure comes from #2 Louisiana State, who owns victories over teams that are currently ranked #4, #9, and #24, while Ohio State has only beaten #17. But as I have said many times on this site, just because a team plays a tougher schedule than another does not mean that that team is better than the other. I think LSU could be ranked #1, but Ohio State has been perfect thus far, so the Buckeyes hold on to the throne for now... if just barely. However, this week LSU plays #5 Auburn, while OSU faces #12 Wisconsin, and if LSU wins, the schedule difference may well be too immense to deny them any longer. We shall see.

TipTop 25 After Week Eight Games

Last week, our top 25 teams took 4 upset losses, a fairly low number, and this week that number decreases to just 3. It has been an unusually stable season for these rankings. This week's TipTop 25 is as follows:

	Team	Record	LW	This Week's Result
#1	Ohio State	7-0	1	Won 52-3 at unrated Northwestern
#2	Louisiana State	7-0	2	Won 36-13 at unrated Mississippi State
#3	Penn State	7-0	7	Won 28-21 over #14 Michigan (now #13)
#4	Florida	7-1	3	Won 38-27 at #28 South Carolina
#5	Auburn	6-1	4	Won 51-10 at unrated Arkansas
#6	Oklahoma	7-0	8	Won 52-14 over unrated West Virginia
#7	Alabama	7-0	10	Won 35-13 over unrated Tennessee
#8	Oregon	6-1	6	Won 35-31 at unrated Washington
#9	Texas	5-2	9	Won 50-48 over unrated Kansas
#10	Appalachian State	6-0	13	Won 52-7 over unrated Louisiana-Monroe
#11	Clemson	7-0	11	Won 45-10 at unrated Louisville
#12	Wisconsin	6-1	5	Lost 24-23 at unrated Illinois
#13	Michigan	5-2	14	Lost 28-21 at #7 Penn State (now #3)
#14	Iowa	5-2	15	Won 26-20 over unrated Purdue
#15	Baylor	7-0	16	Won 45-27 at unrated Oklahoma State
#16	Iowa State	5-2	17	Won 34-24 at unrated Texas Tech
#17	Cincinnati	6-1	18	Won 24-13 at unrated Tulsa
#18	Southern Methodist	7-0	31	Won 45-21 over #19 Temple (now #20)
#19	Boise State	6-1	12	Lost 28-25 at unrated Brigham Young
#20	Temple	5-2	19	Lost 45-21 at #31 Southern Methodist (now #18)
#21	Memphis	6-1	20	Won 47-17 over unrated Tulane
#22	Navy	5-1	21	Won 35-3 over unrated South Florida
#23	Wake Forest	6-1	22	Won 22-20 over unrated Florida State
#24	Utah State	4-2	23	Won 36-10 over unrated Nevada
#25	San Diego State	6-1	25	Won 27-17 at unrated San Jose State

Notes on Changes to This Week's TipTop 25

Penn State moves up to #3 after a second straight victory over a top 25 opponent. They are also helped by the fact that they were ranked #7 in the preseason list, higher than the teams they pass up this week.

Boise State had been rated between Clemson and Appalachian State last week, but their upset loss at BYU sends them downward. Boise State had been ranked #6 in the preseason top 25, Appalachian State #39, which is why I had Boise State rated higher last week. However, without Boise State in the way, Appalachian State compares well to Clemson (both have had just one close win, both coming at North Carolina), who was not rated in the preseason top 50. We're moving Appalachian State ahead of Clemson based on their higher preseason ranking.

Close to the Top 25

The following teams are next in line to be ranked:

#26 Georgia
#27 Notre Dame
#28 Minnesota
#29 Wyoming
#30 Utah
#31 Virginia

Looking Ahead to Next Week's Games

This week we have 2 games featuring top 25 teams: #12 Wisconsin at #1 Ohio State and #5 Auburn at #2 Louisiana State. Because LSU already owns 3 wins over rated teams, 2 of them top 10, a win over Auburn could well send them to #1 regardless of how Ohio State does against #12 Wisconsin. As I said above, we shall see. There is one other game of note, #27 Notre Dame visiting #13 Michigan. A win for the Irish would not only get them back into the top 25, but Georgia as well. Join me next week as we continue to hone the top 25 that was born from my magic hat.

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