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2022 TipTop 25
Week Nine
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 Arkansas was selected first, thereby
securing our
preseason #1 slot. Sadly for the Razorbacks, they were unimpressive
enough
in their opener that they fell out of the top slot immediately, and by
now they have fallen all the way out of the TipTop 25.
As the games are played, I will be ranking teams
completely
blind to their histories and "name" value, so that they are ranked
entirely based on what they do this season and, for the first half of
the season
at least, on
where they were ranked in the preseason (as well as 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 all FCS teams are at a lower power level, and
therefore it
is unacceptable for a ranked FBS team to struggle with an FCS team, let
alone lose. Similarly, 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.
Oklahoma had initially replaced Arkansas at #1, but Ohio State took
over the top slot after Oklahoma lost to Kansas State
on September 24. Ohio State has been very impressive, winning every
game by more than a touchdown, but last week Clemson passed them up
anyway, because Clemson had beaten 4 ranked opponents by then, Ohio
State none. However, it is a close horse race at the top, and this week
we have another change at #1, as covered below.
TipTop
25 After Week Nine Games
As stated above, Clemson had replaced Ohio State at #1 last week,
but this week the Buckeyes regain the throne (for now).
There are 2 reasons for this. The first is that last week, Ohio State
had no wins against ranked opponents, and this week they do, having
just beaten 6-2 Penn State (now #8) 44-31 on the road. The second
reason is that a couple of Clemson's better wins, over Wake Forest and
Syracuse, look a lot
less impressive this week, as both of those teams were routed by
unranked opponents on Saturday. And Clemson barely beat both teams.
Clemson still has 4 wins over ranked teams, and that is still very
impressive, possibly even still worth a #1 ranking. However, those wins
include an overtime victory over #11 and a pair of 6-point wins over
#16 and #18, and those close wins are more the performance of a #6-10
team than a #1 team. Ohio State has beaten every opponent by more than
a touchdown. Furthermore, OSU had been rated #16 in the preseason
TipTop 25, while Clemson had not been ranked in the preseason top 50.
Similarly, we're likewise dropping Clemson behind 8-0 Georgia, who has
also performed much better than Clemson, and who was also rated much
higher in the preseason. The latest rankings:
#1 Ohio State 8-0
#2 Georgia 8-0
#3 Clemson 8-0
#4 Texas
Christian 8-0
#5 Michigan 8-0
#6 Tennessee 8-0
#7 Alabama 7-1
#8 Penn State 6-2
#9 Oregon 7-1
#10 UCLA 7-1
#11 Wake Forest 6-2
#12 Tulane 7-1
#13 Illinois 7-1
#14 Kansas State 6-2
#15 Oklahoma
State 6-2
#16 Syracuse 6-2
#17 North
Carolina State 6-2
#18 Florida State 5-3
#19 Louisiana State 6-2
#20 Mississippi 8-1
#21 Kentucky 5-3
#22 Mississippi
State 5-3
#23 Florida 4-4
#24 Utah 6-2
#25 Southern
Cal 7-1
Notes
on Other Changes to This Week's TipTop 25
We're moving
Georgia up past Clemson, as covered above, but that's not the whole
story here. 8-0 Texas Christian had also been rated higher than Georgia
last week,
and obviously we're moving Georgia ahead of TCU as well. This is
because Georgia has performed better than TCU (Georgia 1 close win over
an unrated opponent, TCU 2), and also because last week, TCU had a win
over a top 10 opponent and Georgia did not, and this week, that
situation is reversed.
Tennessee had not been ranked in the preseason top 50, but at this
point their performance has become too spectacular to ignore (their
latest effort being a 44-6 demolishing of #21 Kentucky), so we're
moving the Volunteers up past Penn State, and while we're at it, we're
pulling Alabama up the rankings with them, as Alabama's only loss came
to Tennessee, and it was very close.
The aforementioned upset losses that 6-2 Wake Forest (now #11) and
6-2 Syracuse (#16) each took to unranked teams this week not only cause
those teams to fall out of the top 10, but their upset losses also trigger a cascade of other
teams to drop in the ratings. This is due to victory chains:
Syracuse has previously beaten North Carolina State, who has beaten
Florida State, who has beaten Louisiana State, who has beaten
Mississippi, who has beaten Kentucky, who has beaten Mississippi State
and Florida, and Florida has beaten Utah, who has beaten Southern Cal,
who has beaten Oregon State. All of those teams drop in the rankings due to the upset losses Wake and 'Cuse took.
6-2 Kansas State had been unranked last week, but they shoot into the
rankings at #14 this week after embarrassing then-#7 Oklahoma State
48-0. 7-1 Tulane, who has previously beaten KSU, shoots up into the
rankings along with the Wildcats.
7-1 Illinois has not beaten a ranked or nearly-ranked team yet, and
they have taken an upset loss to a losing team (Indiana), but we're
bringing them into the TipTop 25 this week at #13 because at this
point, a goodly number of our top 25 teams have taken a loss to an
unranked opponent, and Illinois had been ranked #18 in the preseason
ratings, higher than most of the teams currently in our top 25. And
while Illinois has played a ridiculously easy schedule, they have
performed very well against it. Just 1 of their wins has been close (touchdown or less), while
Kansas State, for example, has posted 2 close wins over unranked
opponents.
Finally, we're dropping Arkansas back behind Southern Cal, and out of
the TipTop 25. That's because South Carolina, who had been ranked #22
last week, was upset by unranked Missouri this week, sending the
Gamecocks out of the list. That hurts Arkansas, as their best win had
come over South Carolina. But Arkansas was also hurt by Cincinnati's
upset loss this week, as the Razorbacks' other big win had come over
the Bearcats.
Close
to the Top 25
These teams are
next in line to be ranked:
#26 Oregon State
#27 Arkansas
#28 Louisville
#29 Notre Dame
#30 North Carolina
#31 Washington
#32 Liberty
#33 Troy
#34 South Alabama
#35 East Carolina
#36 Central Florida
#37 Cincinnati
#38 South Carolina
#39 Purdue
#40 Maryland