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quantum_jedi Ballot for 2025 Week 3

Ballot Type: Computer

Submitted: Sept. 7, 2025, 9:51 a.m.

Overall Rationale: Wins and losses are weighted by the difference in "rank" between the winner/loser and the median team. Scaled such that beating strong teams matters more than beating weak teams, and losing to bad teams is worse than losing to strong teams. Winning is weighted slightly more than losing, and by the preceding two years' performance. Results are scaled by offensive and defensive points per drive efficiencies, and strength of schedule determined by opponents score normalized throughout the season. Preseason rankings are weighted by returning production, talent composite, and previous season(s)' success. Teams ranked #8-#22 are really tight (<0.5 standard deviation), so lots of shuffling and "big" moves in the ranking which is common for the early season. Next five out: Missouri, Pitt, Tulane, UNLV, NC State.

Rank Team Reason
1 Oregon Ducks (+3) Merciless... Maybe Oregon's really good, maybe OK State is really bad, either way that was a beat down.
2 Penn State Nittany Lions (+0) Smothered FIU. Penn State looks as good as billed, but has yet to face a challenge.
3 Ohio State Buckeyes (-2) Pasted Grambling, but drop a bit due to more impactful wins.
4 Georgia Bulldogs (-1) A bit closer than you would like against Austin Peay, but never in doubt.
5 LSU Tigers (+0) Similar to Georgia, LSU struggled more than you would like against Louisiana Tech...
6 Ole Miss Rebels (+2) Dicey win against Kentucky, but always good to start the early season with a conference win.
7 Texas A&M Aggies (+7) Big win for the Aggies over the Aggies. Cruised through the second half.
8 USC Trojans (+1) USC's offense looks impressive. Probably a bittersweet return to the Coliseum for Clay Helton.
9 Indiana Hoosiers (+10) The Hoosiers put the hurt on Kennesaw. They see a big jump due to how efficiency they were on both offense and defense.
10 BYU Cougars (+6) Smothered Stanford, who is certainly far from a good team, but still good work by BYU.
11 Texas Longhorns (-1) Solid bounce-back win for the Longhorns, but they might have serious problems along the offensive line against more athletic teams.
12 Miami Hurricanes (-6) Good win over Bethune, the Hurricanes drop due to very tight packing of teams in the second tier.
13 Illinois Fighting Illini (+9) Won the turnover battle 5-0 against Duke. Solid win over what should be a good Duke team.
14 South Carolina Gamecocks (-7) Slow start against in state FCS opponent SC State, but dominated the middle frames to put the game out of reach. Would have liked to see the Cocks start faster.
15 Notre Dame Fighting Irish (-4) On BYE this week. huge game against Texas A&M next.
16 USF Bulls (+18) Holy crap, Alex Golesh has this USF team on fire! Two ranked wins to start the year with a massive victory AT Florida!
17 Tennessee Volunteers (-6) Crushed East Tennessee State as expected. Drop due to more impressive performances by teams around them.
18 Texas Tech Red Raiders (-1) Beat up on Kent State. Hard to take anything meaningful from this, but nice to see Tech crushing lesser teams.
19 Iowa State Cyclones (+1) That early win over KState in Dublin is looking less impressive every week, but great win this week over Iowa and an El Assico victory for the Cyclones.
20 Nebraska Cornhuskers (+12) Welp, hopefully Akron gets home safely cause that was ugly. Well done Cornhuskers!
21 Oklahoma Sooners (+10) Great win for the Sooners over Michigan! Defense looked legit and Mateer showed how dynamic of a player he can be.
22 Florida State Seminoles (+11) Smoked East Texas A&M. Can Florida State really be back after going 13-1, then 2-10?
23 Louisville Cardinals (+2) Great win for the Cardinals against JMU.
24 Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets (+3) Great start to the year for Georgia Tech. Massive game against Clemson next week.
25 Clemson Tigers (-2) Clemson sneaks into these rankings barely ahead of Mizzou. Struggled with Troy for a while before pulling away.

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