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_TGT7 Ballot for 2023 Week 15 & Bowls

Ballot Type: Human

Submitted: Dec. 3, 2023, 10:46 a.m.

Overall Rationale: Will go over CFP teams in depth, and will explain my reasons for including/not including them

Rank Team Reason
1 Michigan Wolverines 13-0, and two top 10 wins should get Michigan in the #1 spot. I’ve considered Michigan the #1 team for most of the season, but games such as the Maryland game show that they aren’t completely invincible. Michigan hasn’t been particularly close to losing any games, and are the only undefeated P5 to say so, great season, but they’ll probably be sanctioned at some point. Michigan is one of two teams I believe that has 100 percent without a doubt clinched a playoff spot.
2 Washington Huskies 13-0 with two wins over a Oregon team I am keeping in my top 10, and wins against good Arizona, Oregon State, and Utah State, as well as USC, California, and Boise State, even if those teams ran into issues throughout the year. I personally rank Washington lower than Michigan because they haven’t been very dominate in the last few weeks, but they are a stacked team that can make some noise, and has definitely clinched a playoff spot.
3 Florida State Seminoles Louisville game looked quite messy for FSU, and they’ll probably lose by a million to Washington because Jordan Travis is gone, but I believe from a pure resume standpoint, a undefeated Power 5 team who scheduled a tough OOC matchup should make it in. Florida State can’t control how weak their conference is. They have 8 wins over bowl eligible power 5 teams, and have had close games, but I don’t believe they should be left out, even though I could see it happening. Amazing season from FSU, and amazing career from Jordan Travis, and I wish FSU the best.
4 Alabama Crimson Tide People will criticize this choice, and I get it, but I believe from a pure resume standpoint, Alabama is superior to Texas, Alabama has wins against Georgia, Ole Miss, and LSU, who are all top 15 teams, has a win against Tennessee who I believe is extremely overrated but certainly isn’t a bad team by any stretch, and has wins over stronger than their record Kentucky and Texas A&M, the Auburn game is a black eye on Alabama’s resume, but Texas also nearly lost against Kansas State. Texas only true big win in my opinion is the Alabama win, and they have wins over decent Kansas, KSU, and Oklahoma State teams, but no other Top 15 wins, and they lost to a 2 loss Oklahoma team. I won’t be mad if Texas is ranked ahead of Alabama, and I’m certainly biased, but I don’t think Texas wins if Alabama and Texas play again.
5 Texas Longhorns Said what I thought of Texas resume-wise under Alabama, so I’ll take a nicer approach here, congratulations to Texas on going 12-1, winning the Big 12 in their final year, and having legitimate title aspirations. Hopefully Texas can make it to the 12 team playoff next year, which really should’ve been introduced this year.
6 Georgia Bulldogs Georgia from a playoff standpoint I think is finished, they are coming off a loss in the SEC championship game, have a much weaker resume than Alabama, and are similar to Texas resume-wise, but given that Texas beat Alabama and Georgia didn’t, I don’t see them being ranked higher than Texas. Good season from Georgia, it’s just a stacked field this year.
7 Ohio State Buckeyes I haven’t seen anyone state that Ohio State should make the playoff, but given that they are a one loss team, I don’t think they are completely out of the race. Ohio State has nice wins over Notre Dame and Penn State, but that’s it for ranked wins, third best Ohio State win is probably Wisconsin, who is only bowl eligible because of the Big Ten West being awful. Ohio State has the strongest loss, but no other reason to make the playoffs, if CJ Stroud stays another season they are probably a juggernaut, Ohio State needs to keep the defense intact, develop McCord more, and they’ll be in National Championship contention as usual.
8 Oregon Ducks I think if you had told Oregon fans they would go 11-2 with a Pac-12 championship birth and Bo Nix would have an incredible season, they would’ve been happy. How the season actually ended though, was a lot of pain. Oregon competing in the Big 10 will be interesting, and I wonder how that will affect team performance.
9 Penn State Nittany Lions Good season, but Penn State fans don’t really care because they can’t beat their two biggest rivals. I don’t think James Franklin gets the Mark Richt treatment, but people will stay annoyed. I feel like Penn State basically met expectations
10 Ole Miss Rebels Ole Miss definitely exceeded expectations, and Lane Kiffin continues to impress in Oxford. Only blemishes are being uncompetitive against Georgia, and the defense could be better, but given the fanbase, if Lane Kiffin keeps coaching like this, he’ll be known as a legend near there.
11 Missouri Tigers Missouri is one of the few truly surprising top 25 teams. Given all the skepticism about Drinkwitz, this was unexpected, with most people (like me) expecting them to go 7-5 or maybe 8-4. They weren’t that far away from beating LSU or Georgia, and if they win one of those games, we are talking about a potential cfp team and not just someone who had a good season. I like Missouri, and wish them well for next season
12 Oklahoma Sooners While the final ranking falls into expectations, I think Oklahoma blew a easy bath to the playoffs, all they had to do was get past Kansas and Oklahoma State, who aren’t bad teams, but are teams you should beat if you are Oklahoma, vast improvement from last season though, and Oklahoma should be a playoff contender for years to come.
13 LSU Tigers Disappointing season for LSU fans given the quality of the offense this season. LSU hired Brian Kelly to win championships, not finish 9-3 every season. Losing Jayden Daniels is going to sting, and you hope the defense will be improved next season. Will be a big “what if” season for LSU fans for years to come
14 Notre Dame Fighting Irish Notre Dame got unlucky in the Ohio State game, and winning that game changes the trajectory of their season. Not a bad season, but as a Notre Dame fan I would’ve expected more, and the Louisville and Clemson games definitely sting. Wonder how they’ll do next year
15 Liberty Flames Liberty is only ranked because they haven’t lost, if they lost even one game, I would send them flying off my rankings. Their SOS is terrible, but undefeated is undefeated, and I believe they should get the NY6 bowl spot over a two loss SMU. If SMU only had one loss or if Tulane won I would’ve supported putting those teams in, but two losses is harder to justify. Kaidon Salter is also a very underrated quarterback.
16 Arizona Wildcats Quite the turnaround for Arizona, who started the season as 9 point underdogs to Mississippi State, and who ended up being USC’s best victory by far this season. Given how good Noah Fifita was as a freshman, I expect Arizona to be good for years to come.
17 Louisville Cardinals The Jeff Brohm hire which I personally thought wasn’t going to work out has smashed any expectations Louisville had for year one. They are far from a perfect team, but given how shaky they looked against Georgia Tech, getting to 10 wins is no easy feat for any team, and they should be rewarded for that.
18 NC State Wolfpack NC State was a very consistent team this year, they didn’t have many big wins (Clemson and North Carolina were their biggest), but given that they had no bad losses, this was a very under-the-radar season for a team that isn’t really being talked about. Wonder how they’ll be looked at next season.
19 Oregon State Beavers Oregon State had a good season against one of the toughest schedules in the country, but has now lost their quarterback, coach, and conference after this season. Jonathan Smith brought the team back from the dead, but Oregon State will be going through rough times over the next few seasons
20 James Madison Dukes Very annoyed that the Dukes weren’t able to play in the Sun Belt championship, and that they’ll be relegated to some low tier bowl game. Now that they lost their coach, I hope that they’ll be able to keep up their success in a increasingly tougher sun belt.
21 SMU Mustangs Great season for SMU, only thing that didn’t go their way was the TCU game, but just about everything went right for this team, which gives them a lot of momentum entering the ACC. Preston Stone should be great the next few years, and I don’t see SMU going back to mediocrity anytime soon.
22 Iowa Hawkeyes Iowa is probably a 6-6 team in any other power 5 conference, and may not even get 10 wins in the G5. Their defense was pristine this season. Only reason Michigan and Penn State scored more than 20 points was because the offense was so bad it set those teams up with short fields. Iowa has got to hit on this offensive coordinator position, or they will no longer be competitive. Sickos team does Sickos things
23 Troy Trojans Troy could easily have back to back 12 win seasons in the Sun Belt. Very good team that hasn’t been talked about very much. I wonder if any teams will try poaching Jon Sumrall. Congrats to Troy on winning the Sun Belt, and hopefully people start putting you in AP Polls.
24 Tulane Green Wave Tulane did go 11-2 on paper and have a similar season to last year, but I can’t help but feel like they got really lucky this season. 4-0 in one possession games where three of those teams didn’t go bowling isn’t sustainable, and this was probably Tulane’s last shot to be special given that Willie Fritz is probably leaving. Still a great turnaround of a program that wasn’t doing anything special a few years ago.
25 Miami (OH) RedHawks Miami was a true surprise to be ranked this year, given the fact that they got blown out by Miami FL, once they beat cincinnati (which in retrospect isn’t a upset at all), it looked more likely that they could make noise, and after the Miami FL game, Miami OH beat every remaining team on their schedule at least once, avenging a Toledo loss in the CCG. I have no idea how this team will do next season, but I wish them the best of luck.

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