Welcome back everyone to another year of Ridley’s Rankings! That’s right, Oregon Sports News agreed for some reason to keep posting my rankings, so you’re stuck with me for another 10 weeks or so. If you actually happen to enjoy this, don’t forget to check out me and my co-host Matt on the Simply Awesome Sports podcast as well.
If you are new to the rankings, here’s a quick rundown: I take a statistical/quasi-sabermetric approach to the rankings, much in the way that the computer rankings for the BCS formula did, but much less sophisticated. My rankings use algorithms and formulas that include stats like winning percentage (duh!), opponent ranks and winning percentage, score differential, wins on the road, normalized scoring performance, close victories and conference. Additionally, the AP polls are used as a guiding light during the early part of the season to offset small sample-sized bias. The impact of the poll is lessened each week as the numbers start to tell their own story.
You will also see a lot of numbers in the rankings that may be confusing. The first number is the team’s score out of 100. The top team is the pole-setter and will always receive 100.00. This is not to say this team is perfect, but that they are the mark to which other teams are measured. One thing I have added this year is where each team would have ranked were it not for the AP’s influence, or how strong that team’s season currently is. This will be the number in the brackets “[]”. Again, these numbers are currently subject to limited samples, so don’t take them too seriously. With that said, let’s move on to the rankings!
The Rankings
1. Oregon (100.00) [3] – Oregon is heavily benefiting from a strong win over Michigan State two weeks ago. A close victory against the Cougars hurts the Ducks a little, but they have still be above average in every game this season.
2. Florida State (97.80) [16] – Yes, that is not a lie, FSU is currently 16th in the AP-less rankings. A close victory over an underrated Oklahoma State team and consistently low point totals are a big reason. Their +37 point differential is the third-lowest out of all undefeated teams and two-thirds of that (25 points) came against FCS school, the Citadel.
3. Alabama (96.88) [5] – After a startling close game against the Mountaineers, Alabama has been playing strong football. Blake Sims has looked better each week and now has a week to rest before facing off against the 10th-ranked Rebels.
4. Oklahoma (94.44) [4] – The Sooners wrap up Week 4 with the largest normalized scoring differential. They haven’t played a ranked team yet, but the schedule begins to stiffen when they head to Fort Worth to play a should-be 3-0 Horned Frogs squad.
5. Auburn (94.09) [2] – The Tigers have the second-best season to date with a win over then 20th-ranked K-State and a 24-point beatdown of 3-1 Arkansas. Their high-powered offense was slowed by the Wildcats defensive line but a visit from Louisiana Tech should help right their offensive woes.
6. Texas A&M (87.94) [8] – Kenny Hill and the Aggies started strong with a surprising win over the Gamecocks in Week 1 but have sinced faced teams that have won zero-combined games in the FBS level this year. Playing the Razorbacks in Jerry World should offer a harder test.
7. Baylor (82.22) [24] – Baylor was a team my rankings absolutely loved last year. Their high-scoring offense made my numbers drool. They are still averaging nearly 60 points a pop, but won’t play a notable team until Week 11 in Norman (yes, Texas doesn’t count as notable).
8. Notre Dame (80.07) [20] – The Golden Domers had a bye week before they head to upstate New York to face the Orange. Their schedule takes a turn for the worse as they play Stanford, UNC and Florida State in three consecutive weeks.
9. Ole Miss (78.18) [6] – Hugh Freeze has the Runnin’ Rebs up to their highest ranking since Week 3 of the 2009 season. They had a week off to rest for 2-1 Memphis before taking on Alabama, in what should be a showdown of top-10 teams.
10. UCLA (75.01) [10] – The Bruins round out the top ten, although they haven’t looked great down it. They have won their games by just a combined 18 points, but their opponents may be better than people realize. They face their first big test, #15 Arizona State, after a week off.
11. Mississippi State (72.99) [1] – The Dawgs have the dubious title of having college football’s best resume after four weeks, thanks to a win over the 8th-ranked Tigers in Baton Rouge.
12. Michigan State (71.94) [41] – As the 41 denotes, the Spartans aren’t here on merit. While there’s no shame in losing to the Ducks, the numbers suggest their are more deserving candidates.
13. South Carolina (68.22) [15] – After a Week 1 dismantling at the hands of the Aggies, the Ole Ballcoach’s team is starting to gain momentum. Next up is Missouri, fresh off a bad defeat to Indiana.
14. Georgia (63.67) [48] – Another case of the numbers not liking a 2-1 team. Even a 66-point shellacking over Troy can’t cover up the stench of a loss.
15. Arizona State (62.82) [18] – The Sun Devils are tied with FSU in normalized scoring differential, despite having an actual differential of 80 points. What does this mean? Beating Weber State, New Mexico and Colorado isn’t impressive.
16. LSU (57.61) [23] – The Bayou Bengals fell at home to Mississippi State over the weekend, likely eliminating them from a chance at the playoffs. On the bright side, they are one of two teams to have a loss and still be in the top-25 AP-less rankings.
17. Stanford (52.85) [51] – The Cardinal find themselves so low in the numbers due to their only wins coming over Army and UC-Davis.
18. BYU (51.53) [11] – The Cougars schedule doesn’t scream quality but teams like Houston and Virginia could prove to be valuable resume builders.
19. USC (51.30) [33] – A big letdown against BC after finally beating Stanford has to sting for Steve Sarkisian. Time will tell if a week off will help them against the Beavers.
20. Nebraska (47.50) [25] – The Huskers are undefeated, but they have a bright yellow sign reading “NOT TO BE TRUSTED” in big, bold letters hovering above them at all times.
21. Wisconsin (46.58) [46] – The Badgers laid the hammer down on Bowling Green over the weekend as they try to put the LSU loss in their rearview window.
22. East Carolina (39.91) [31] – Apparently losing to South Carolina by only 10 points is a a good thing. It must be, because beating Virginia Tech looks much less impressive now.
23. Arizona (38.49) [7] – Being 4-0 certainly helps the Wildcats, but so does being the only loss for Cal and Nevada at this point. Smart money says they won’t be here after facing Oregon in two weeks.
24. North Carolina State (38.46) [9] – After a dismal performance against Georgia Southern, NC State has won games by 12, 32 and 42, respectively.
25. TCU (36.46) [12] – The king of the small sample size, 2-0 TCU sneaks into the top 25 with a 23-point victory over Minnesota as the only thing to note.
Ranked Teams Left Out
There were three teams ranked by the AP but left out of my rankings: Ohio State (27), Oklahoma State (34) and Kansas State (40). All three of these teams’ rankings were too low to overcome the losses they had in their jacket, allowing Arizona, NC State and TCU to slip in with undefeated records.
Oregon Teams Watch
The Ducks have already been covered, as they currently sit atop the rankings (which is NOT a pandering move). The Beavers find themselves at 35 in the rankings but were 27th based on numbers, only. While being 3-0 is always a good thing, OSU’s strength of schedule leaves much to be desired. Luckily for them, USC is more than willing to help them with that problem. The Ducks, meanwhile, will be watching from home on their bye week.
Other Notable Teams
Arkansas (26) is other team with a loss to be ranked in the top 25 by the numbers … Penn State (28), Duke (29), Washington (30), Utah (31), Georgia Tech (32), Marshall (33) and Cincinnati (36) are the other undefeated teams in FBS … Boise State leads the Mountain West at 39 … West Virginia (41) is the highest-ranked .500 team … Northern Illinois (59) leads the MAC … Louisiana-Monroe (63) is tops among the Sun Belt … Vanderbilt (105) is the worst SEC team … Rice (113) and SMU (119) are the two best teams without a win … speaking of which, our bottom five for our first week are Idaho (124), Miami (OH), Massachusetts, Troy and Kent State (129).
Add The Sports Daily to your Google News Feed!
