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T-Thugs Ballot for 2018 Week 5

Ballot Type: Human

Submitted: Sept. 24, 2018, 11:18 p.m.

Overall Rationale: So each week I try to redo my rankings based on who a team has played and defeated and not so much on whether or not I think the team will be good. For that reason, my early poll rankings vary wildly from week to week as teams start to play good teams. Also, early in the season, I have good teams that haven't played anyone yet pretty low. For example, this week I have Penn State and Oklahoma lower than one might expect, because they still haven't gotten a win over a team worth mentioning. I do think those are good teams, though. They will move up my poll when they win big games. I generally am on the "most controversial" list early in the season, but as we get later on, my poll starts to look more like everyone else's.

Rank Team Reason
1 LSU Tigers Wins over Miami and Auburn are the best in college.
2 Alabama Crimson Tide I think they are the best team, but their resume still isn't as impressive as LSU's. Beatdown of Texas AM was quite impressive, as was their beating of Ole Miss, but those teams are not quite Miami and Auburn.
3 Stanford Cardinal Stanford has 2 quality wins with USC and Oregon. Huge matchup with Notre dame this weekend.
4 Kentucky Wildcats Undefeated with solid wins over Florida and Mississippi State.
5 Notre Dame Fighting Irish Notre Dame's win over Michigan jumped Ohio State's win over TCU for me since TCU picked up a second loss. Huge matchup with Stanford this weekend. 
6 California Golden Bears Their win over 3-1 BYU (who beat Wisconsin) is still one of the best wins early this season. We'll see if that really means as much when BYU plays Washington this week.
7 Georgia Bulldogs Wins over Missouri and South Carolina. Neither of those teams really have an impressive win under them, but neither has lost to anyone else yet. South Carolina win would look really good if they beat Kentucky this week. 
8 Ohio State Buckeyes Best win is over TCU, which looks a little less impressive this week since TCU lost to Texas. A win over Penn State would put the buckeyes right back up near the top again. 
9 Clemson Tigers Best win is over 2-2 Texas A&M who just got beat by 22 by Alabama. Not sure getting beatdown by Alabama will be that uncommon, but without Texas AM having any really good wins, it's hard to know what that means. Other wins are over bad teams. Actually have a potentially decent game with Syracuse this week. (I have Syracuse ranked currently)
10 West Virginia Mountaineers 3-0, best wins over Tennessee (less good after Florida beating) and Kansas State (also got beatdown by Miss. St)
11 Duke Blue Devils Duke is undefeated with wins over Army (who just took Oklahoma to overtime), Baylor, and Northwestern. Might be a little high, but their resume is decent. They play Virginia tech this week.
12 Auburn Tigers My highest one loss team. Auburn has a really good win over Washington. Only loss is to LSU. 
13 Texas Tech Red Raiders Raiders are 3-1, Best win is over Oklahoma State (3-1, defeated Boise State). Next best win is over Houston (3-1). I'd have them above Auburn based only on wins, but they also got slapped around by Ole Miss and Auburn is a last second field goal away from being my #1 team. 
14 BYU Cougars BYU is 3-1 with a really great win on the road at Wisconsin (looks better this week after Wisconsin won at Iowa). 
15 Maryland Terrapins Maryland is really hard to rank. They have what is turning out to be a very good win over Texas, and also defeated Minnesota (3-1, best win over Fresno state). they also have a very bad loss to Temple. Maryland has this week off, but plays at Michigan in a couple weeks. That will let us know where Maryland really belongs.
16 Texas Longhorns Texas has a loss to Maryland, which is hard to know how bad that is. They also have wins over USC and TCU, which are both looking like solid wins (despite having 2 losses).
17 Washington Huskies Lost a really close game to Auburn. Wins over Utah (2-1) and Arizona State (beat Michigan State) . Kind of a big game this week with BYU. 
18 Syracuse Orange Beating up on some bad teams. Their offense looks legit, but we'll find out for sure when they play Clemson this week.
19 Oklahoma Sooners Looked unstoppable in their first two games (against bad teams) but have struggled the past couple weeks with Iowa State and then Army. Nonetheless, Sooners are 4-0. 
20 Penn State Nittany Lions Penn State still is lower than they probably should be in my poll due to their lack of a standout win. Best win is over Pittsburgh (not very good). They will have lots of opportunities to move up soon though, starting with a game vs Ohio State this week. A win there would jump them very far up the poll. 
21 Wisconsin Badgers Back into my poll this week after beating Iowa on the road. Home loss to BYU hurt. Probably gonna win the Big Ten west. 
22 Michigan Wolverines After their season opening loss to ND, Michigan has been wrecking teams. Granted, those teams stink. We'll know soon where Michigan belongs. They play Northwestern this week, followed by Maryland, Wisconsin, and Michigan State. 
23 Oklahoma State Cowboys Lost to Texas Tech but still have a nice win over Boise State.
24 Michigan State Spartans MSU sneaks back into my poll after winning on the road at Indiana (3-1). 
25 Florida Gators Big win over Tennessee this week. Only loss is to Kentucky.

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