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Comit22 Ballot for 2022 Week 11

Ballot Type: Human

Submitted: Nov. 6, 2022, 11:14 a.m.

Rank Team Reason
1 Georgia Bulldogs One of only 4 undefeated teams. Wins over 8-1 Tennessee and 8-1 Oregon. None of the other undefeated teams have a pair of wins that good.
2 Ohio State Buckeyes Although Ohio State's best wins are over a 7-2 Penn State and a 6-3 Notre Dame, they get the nod over Michigan because they've been just as good as UM at blowing out opponents while also having a better 2nd win (Notre Dame > Maryland).
3 Michigan Wolverines Michigan is really close to the #2 spot here. They beat Penn State much cleaner than Ohio State did, but lack a 2nd win as good as Ohio State's Notre Dame win. Ultimately I'm not worried though since the two will get to settle this on their field in a few weeks.
4 TCU Horned Frogs TCU is the last of the unbeatens and are really unfortunate in that 3 of their 4 "ranked wins" came against teams that are no longer ranked (Oklahoma, Kansas, Oklahoma St.) and their 4th is against a Kansas St. team that I have barely clinging on to a top 25 spot (#23). At this point, the game is simple for the Horned Frogs, though. Win their last 4 games and they will get a top 3 spot guaranteed.
5 Tennessee Volunteers Of the 1-loss teams, the two at the top will be the teams with the least embarrassing losses. And that starts with Tennessee, who got beat handedly but didn't let the game completely get away against #1 Georgia. The Alabama win still looks good and the LSU win looks better every day. Keeping it closer against Georgia is what is giving the Vols the hand over Oregon right now, because Oregon has the better win against UCLA.
6 Oregon Ducks Speaking of Oregon, losing to Georgia barely counts as a negative anymore and the UCLA win looks better and better. At this point, with one of Ohio State and Michigan guaranteed to lose a game, Oregon likely controls their own destiny and can punch a ticket to the Playoff if they win out (please I'm begging for a Playoff with TCU and Oregon).
7 UCLA Bruins After the pair of teams with Georgia losses, we have UCLA, whose only loss is to Oregon. And with good wins over Utah and Washington teams that are still ranked, UCLA also controls their own destiny and could grab a playoff spot by running the table (which would necessitate wins over USC and Oregon).
8 Ole Miss Rebels That LSU loss really doesn't look so bad, now does it? Ole Miss lacks any wins over current top 25 teams, and that's what has them clearly below the top 7 teams here. It's very close between the Rebels, Clemson, USC and LSU (especially considering I'd rank LSU over Ole Miss given the H2H if I found them next to each other), but Ole Miss has still been plenty good and has a chance to prove themselves worthy of this spot next week against the Tide.
9 USC Trojans USC's loss against #14 Utah doesn't look very bad at all right now (though is clearly a loss to a worse team than UT, Oregon, UCLA, or Ole Miss suffered) but the Trojans completely lack high quality wins. A W over a borderline top 25 Oregon State squad is the best they can muster, and that was a very tough game for USC. The showdown with #7 UCLA in 2 weeks will be huge for determining which Pac-12 team rises to the top.
10 Clemson Tigers Again, Clemson is really close with Ole Miss, LSU, and USC. It would have helped if Clemson's old ranked opponents stayed ranked, but Syracuse and Wake Forest have both dropped off, leaving only the NC State win as a good win for Clemson. And while Notre Dame is ranked again, the Irish have really terrible losses to Marshall and Stanford that make a Notre Dame loss the worst for any 1-loss team.
11 LSU Tigers Hello Tigers. Wins over #12 Alabama and #8 Ole Miss look amazing right now, and the loss to #5 Tennessee doesn't look bad either. The only hiccup is a loss to Florida State, who remains just outside of the top 25. Despite that, the H2H over Alabama combined with being Ole Miss' only loss makes LSU the highest ranked 2-loss team right now.
12 Alabama Crimson Tide Oh how the mighty have fallen. Losses to #5 Tennessee and #11 LSU aren't bad at all for a 2-loss team, but do not indicate a true powerhouse team. The only one of Alabama's wins that still counts as a ranked win is #20 Texas and, truthfully, the only reason the Tide are still this high is because of reputation.
13 North Carolina Tar Heels So, it turns out that Clemson is not the only 1-loss team to have been beaten by Notre Dame. What UNC lacks, however, is any semblance of a quality win. Their best win was likely their nail-biter over a bad Duke team. That's how they've gotten placed behind a pair of 2-loss teams, but UNC could propel themselves much higher if they're able to run the table with wins over NC State and Clemson (though they would still need help to make the Playoff in that scenario).
14 Utah Utes The loss to #7 UCLA doesn't look bad at all right now. The loss to unranked Florida does, and that loss has only gotten more confusing. What really saves Utah here is a fantastic win over #9 USC, which is truthfully the 2nd best win any 2-loss team has right now (only trailing LSU's win against #8 Ole Miss). I could see some movement between Alabama, UNC, and Utah and not be upset, but I feel like these 3 teams are all kinda grouped together in this range. Utah comes last for me because they have the worst loss (and specifically the worst loss of any team ranked to this point).
15 Penn State Nittany Lions This isn't a bad Penn St. squad, and their losses to #2 Ohio State and #3 Michigan aren't bad either. They just haven't racked up any high-quality wins to push them above other 2-loss teams. And, truth be told, the Nittany Lions likely won't get a shot against another elite team until bowl season. Still, PSU stays above NC State because PSU is yet to really have a bad loss.
16 NC State Wolfpack Speaking of NC State, the Wolfpack's loss to #10 Clemson doesn't look bad, but their loss to a currently unranked Syracuse does. And none of NC State's wins are against opponents that are currently ranked. This is definitely one of the more mediocre 2-loss teams, and that likely won't change without a big performance against UNC.
17 Tulane Green Wave Finally, our first G5 team. Tulane is clearly the class of the G5 right now. Of the G5 teams with only 1 loss (Tulane, Coastal, and Liberty [who I refuse to rank]), Tulane's résumé jumps out. A win over #23 Kansas St. is utterly fantastic even though the loss to a 5-4 Southern Miss squad is rough. Still, they have a better win than Penn State or NC State can muster, and are only this low due to that truly sad loss.
18 Washington Huskies Washington lacks high-quality wins. Their best win is over a 6-3 Oregon St. squad and, despite the loss to #7 UCLA not being bad at all, they sport a miserable loss to a 3-6 Arizona St. team. We're officially into the territory of bad 2-loss teams right now, and having a loss on-par with Tulane's while not having a win as good means that Washington is clearly below Tulane to me.
19 Coastal Carolina Chanticleers Staying in the realm of teams without high-quality wins, Coastal truly hasn't beaten anyone of note. And they have to wear a bad loss to a 3-6 Old Dominion squad. What keeps them this high is just avoiding losses. There are 1-loss teams from #5 to #19 and Coastal is clearly the worst of the bunch. Still, I won't rank a team with 1 loss behind a team with 3, so they stay above the likes of Texas, Notre Dame, and Kansas St. for now.
20 Texas Longhorns I don't think that there's much doubt that Texas is the best 3-loss team in the country. There should be warning bells going off about how Texas Tech and Oklahoma St., 2 teams that Texas has lost to, are not ranked, but those are pretty tame losses in the world of 3-loss teams. And they sport a good win over #23 Kansas St. (and a pretty decent win over a 7-2 UTSA team). The big test comes next week against TCU and it'll be clear just how good the Longhorns are then.
21 UCF Knights As far as G5 2-loss teams go, UCF is pretty solid. They have a win over #25 Cincinnati and their losses are to 6-3 Louisville and 6-3 East Carolina, not bad at all. The fact that those losses aren't to bad teams is what keeps UCF this high and what gets them above Illinois and Notre Dame (who both had bad losses).
22 Notre Dame Fighting Irish What in the world is this Notre Dame team. They have wins over #10 Clemson and #13 North Carolina but also have losses to Marshall and Stanford. The fact that Illinois also has bad losses is what keeps the Irish above them, but ND's own bad losses keep them from going higher. I have no idea what to do with this team and can't wait to see them face off with USC in a few weeks.
23 Kansas State Wildcats What gets Kansas St. the last of the 3 spots given to 3-loss teams here is that none of their losses are bad. Losses to #4 TCU, #17 Tulane, and #20 Texas don't qualify as bad here. None of their wins are against currently-ranked teams, so they don't get to go very high but it's hard to say that this is a bad team. They beat the teams they're supposed to beat and don't beat the teams better than them. And that's ok. They have a couple good matchups left but this, to me, feels like the 3-loss P5 team with the most stable résumé.
24 Illinois Fighting Illini Somehow, Illinois' résumé is pretty bad despite them being 7-2. No notable wins (the best are over 6-3 Minnesota and 5-4 Wisconsin) and 2 pretty bad losses to 4-5 Michigan St. and 3-6 Indiana. Combine that with no high-quality wins and Illinois is clearly the worst P5 team with 2 losses. And I think it's pretty easy to see that they compare unfavorably to Texas.
25 Cincinnati Bearcats This would have been Liberty's spot but I refuse to rank Liberty. So you get an ok Cincinnati team that has a loss to an Arkansas team that really isn't that good. None of Cincy's wins count as quality wins, and we're really just playing the waiting game until Cincy plays Tulane and gets a shot at something big.

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