Week 11 Rankings: TCU-Utah Game was a Dud

I didn't get to see many of the games last weekend - just part of North Carolina's victory over Florida State and, of course Georgia Tech versus Virginia Tech - but all the top ranked teams won handily. The TCU-Utah game, which was supposed to be the game of the week between two top 5 teams, turned out to be a real dud. The SEC East, which has for years been among the strongest divisions in football with Floriga, Georgia, and Tennessee, is a bit of a mess. With three weeks to go, no team in that division has less than 2 conference losses and 3 overall losses. Florida and South Carolina play this Saturday for eastern division title to get a shot at Auburn in the SEC Championship game, unless Auburn loses to Georgia and Alabama, a very unlikely scenario.

Much like TCU, Boise State clobbered a substantial opponent in Hawaii. Hawaii came in a 7-2 with a win over the ranked Nevada team, but could get nothing going against the Broncos. Kellen Moore threw for over 500 yards while the Bronco defense held the Hawaii Warriors run and shoot offense, which had been averaging a whopping 370 passing yards per game, to merely 151.

LSU and Alabama was probably the best-played game of the weekend, the other matchup between two top 10 teams. LSU came out on top in a very physical game, but they needed more 4^th down heroics to pull it off and all but clinch the western division for Auburn.

Georgia Tech lost their starting quarterback Josh Nesbitt in the second quarter against the Hokies but with backup Tevin Washington, the Yellow Jackets hung in there and had a good chance to tie late in the 4^th quarter. But Washington threw an interception in the endzone with under a minute to go to seal the 28-21 victory for Virginia Tech. Maybe Virginia Tech can be the first ACC team to go undefeated in the conference in 10 years - the longest time any conference has gone so long without an undefeated team in conference play. Only Miami, North Carolina, and Virginia remain on their schedule.

So, here are my rankings after 10 weeks. Undefeated Oregon dropped again behind 3 teams with one loss and one team with 2 losses! It must be that strength of schedule rank of 110 that is not getting them respect in my computer (or in the BCS computers, where they are 3^rd).

Rank Prev BCS W L Team Total Rtg. SS Rank
1 1 2 10 0 Auburn 99.479 16
2 8 4 8 0 Boise 93.870 65
3 4 3 10 0 TCU 90.438 86
4 15 5 8 1 LSU 87.276 7
5 10 9 9 1 OhioSt 86.353 73
6 11 10 8 1 OkSt 85.237 45
7 9 12 7 2 Alabama 85.070 13
8 5 1 9 0 Oregon 83.441 110
9 17 6 8 1 Stan 82.127 67
10 14 7 8 1 Wisconsin 80.522 69
11 23 15 7 2 Ark 80.035 11
12 6 13 7 2 Iowa 79.995 40
13 7 11 9 1 michst 78.375 74
14 3 16 7 2 Okla 78.121 19
15 2 17 7 2 Mizzou 76.913 30
16 21 20 7 2 VT 73.645 63
17 19 19 7 2 msu 73.058 44
18 16 18 7 2 Ariz 72.990 43
19 12 8 7 1 Neb 72.481 90
20 25 21 9 1 nevada 72.115 101
21 18 14 8 0 Utah 71.282 119
22 31 6 3 Miami 70.215 18
23 32 6 3 UNC 69.000 8
24 20 7 3 hawaii 68.987 53
25 40 25 6 3 texam 68.284 28