The Ralphie Report Ballot - Week 5
| Rank | Team | Delta |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | LSU Tigers |
 1 |
| 2 | Alabama Crimson Tide |
1 |
| 3 | Oklahoma Sooners |
 -2 |
| 4 | Wisconsin Badgers | -- |
| 5 | Oklahoma St. Cowboys |
3 |
| 6 | Boise St. Broncos |
-1 |
| 7 | Oregon Ducks |
-1 |
| 8 | Stanford Cardinal |
-1 |
| 9 | Nebraska Cornhuskers |
3 |
| 10 | Clemson Tigers |
11 |
| 11 | Virginia Tech Hokies |
4 |
| 12 | South Florida Bulls |
5 |
| 13 | Baylor Bears |
3 |
| 14 | South Carolina Gamecocks | -- |
| 15 | West Virginia Mountaineers |
-2 |
| 16 | Florida Gators |
4 |
| 17 | Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets | -- |
| 18 | Arkansas Razorbacks |
-7 |
| 19 | Illinois Fighting Illini |
3 |
| 20 | Arizona St. Sun Devils | -- |
| 21 | Michigan Wolverines |
2 |
| 22 | Florida St. Seminoles |
-12 |
| 23 | Texas A&M Aggies |
-14 |
| 24 | Texas Longhorns |
-5 |
| 25 | Missouri Tigers | -- |
| Dropouts: USC Trojans, San Diego St. Aztecs, North Carolina Tar Heels | ||
SB Nation BlogPoll College Football Top 25 Rankings "
Next Five:
26) Washington
27) Kansas St.
28) North Carolina
29) Michigan St.
30) TCU
See my Pac-12 Rankings as well as some notes about my ballot after the jump...
Pac-12 Rankings:
1) Oregon
2) Stanford
3) Arizona State
4) Washington
5) California
6) USC
7) Utah
8) Arizona
9) Colorado
10) Washington State
11) UCLA
12) Oregon State
Check out my complete, conference by conference rankings here.
Notes On The Rankings:
- I'm stuck on an airplane back from Columbus after a few Jack & Ginger's so expect some extended commentary this week (not sure if that's a good or bad thing).
- I had to defend my choice to keep Oklahoma first last week after another strong road win for LSU (at Mississippi St.) and I mentioned that I wouldn't be able to continue that this week if the Tigers (or Bama) won convincingly at West Virginia and the Sooners did not. Well, at this point it's nearly impossible to argue that the two SEC West schools should stand alone at the top two spots. The Sooners came out flat at home against Missouri and lost one of (and maybe the) best offensive lineman in the conference for the next 6-8 weeks. Florida State losing at Clemson, even though the game was close and Clint Trickett played well, didn't help. If things keep continuing down this path we're seeing a playoff take shape on its own with late season semi-finals between LSU and Alabama and Oklahoma and Oklahoma State (sorry Stanford/B1G, but thanks for playing).
- After that first 3 there is a second tier of teams that are pretty hard to rank at this point. Wisconsin, Boise State, Oklahoma State, Stanford, Oregon, Nebraska, and Clemson have all started strong (I'm not going to punish the Ducks too much for losing to the new #1 team in a virtual home game for the Tigers), but need help from the three teams at the top (except for Oklahoma State, who will most likely jump above everyone but the SEC team left standing with a last week win over a #1 or #2 ranked Sooner team) to figure into the National Championship race. Two of the teams will fall from this tier on Saturday as Nebraska heads to Wisconsin and Clemson heads to Virginia Tech.
- I didn't realize this until I had finished, but all of a sudden I have all but three Big 12 teams ranked with Iowa State right there on the cusp of the top 30. I went back and took a second look at all of them and couldn't find someone that didn't belong. Outside of Kansas' awful performance at Georgia Tech and Texas Tech's narrow win against Nevada, the conference has pretty much rolled through the non-conference schedule. Hate you Texas A&M.
- Yes, it's the WAC, but I rank all of the conferences from top to bottom except for the Sun Belt (and the MAC gets just a cursory glance) so I still have to go through and figure it out each week. It was a bit depressing having to put Ha-va-ii in the fifth spot in a conference generally regarded as the second worst BCS outfit. That game in Honolulu is going to be the one we look back at and say "what if."
- It looks like I finally have to give the Sun Devils their due. It's hard to argue that they aren't the Pac-12 South favorites at this point, especially with Missouri showing up in Norman the way that they did. Washington staked their claim as the 3rd best team in the North, but that could change very quickly. My bottom 4 in the conference has stayed consistent over the last few weeks, but I keep debating whether or not I am being biased about the Buffs. I mean, the Bruins did just win a road game... Either way, we should know exactly where CU stands after the game against Washington State on Saturday.
Who would you move up or down?