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PlactusTX Ballot for 2026 Week 6

Ballot Type: Hybrid

Submitted: Oct. 4, 2026, 3:20 a.m.

Overall Rationale: First divide teams into tiers, then sort within each tier.

Last week my ballot's unusualness shot way up, a wake-up call that it was time to start evaluating teams purely on the merits of what they've actually done, not where I thought they'd be at the start of the season.
At the start of the season, tiers were determined on a projected finish. With spot adjustments – if a team beats a higher-tier team, the winning team will move up and/or the losing team will move down until they're on the same tier – this will serve as a basis until tiers can be properly evaluated based entirely on actual results.

So, I went through each team – without looking where I had them last week – and placed them into six tiers. Then I went through the list and looked for teams I had judged too leniently or too harshly until the list stabilized. My goal is for the top three tiers to be roughly the first quartile, then the next three to be each of the next quartiles.

Tier 2 is currently the hardest to populate – aside from the top contenders, everybody's got issues. My first pass had the top teams from the Big 12 in the group, with only Iowa (who got beat soundly), Pitt (undefeated against a fairly soft early schedule), and the SEC one-loss group (where every team added pushed another to the top of the tier, and I ended up with 7 SEC teams in my top 11) really convincing that they deserve to be there.

Dropped out: 12 Michigan, 17 Louisville, 18 Duke, 19 Auburn, 20 Virginia Tech, 23 Clemson, 24 Kentucky, 25 Southern Methodist

First five out: Nebraska, James Madison, Duke, Kentucky, North Dakota State

Rank Team Reason
1 Texas Longhorns LW: 1 | Tier 1 | bye
2 Alabama Crimson Tide LW: 9 | Tier 1 (up) | W Mississippi State
3 Ohio State Buckeyes LW: 5 | Tier 1 | W Iowa
4 Notre Dame Fighting Irish LW: 3 | Tier 1 | W North Carolina
5 Miami Hurricanes LW: 11 | Tier 1 (up) | W Clemson

I had Miami in tier 2 up to this point because preseason I expected them to lose to Notre Dame and the rest of the schedule wasn't good enough to justify putting them in tier 1. But for now, their resume isn't much different from Notre Dame's. If Pitt keeps winning the matchup in a few weeks will be interesting.
6 Georgia Bulldogs LW: 2 | Tier 1 | W Vanderbilt

Oklahoma dropped from tier 3 to tier 4, and that dragged down Georgia's resume. The good news, they've got a potential replacement best win coming.
7 Indiana Hoosiers LW: 7 | Tier 1 | W Rutgers

Indiana is honestly tier 1 based on being defending national champions and undefeated. They've got a decent match next week vs Nebraska before the big one vs Ohio State.
8 Mississippi State Bulldogs LW: NR | Tier 2 (up) | L Alabama

They should've been ranked last week, and even with the Alabama loss Missouri's win makes them look pretty good. Best I could do here is order the teams to preserve who beat who, so Mississippi State beat Missouri...
9 Missouri Tigers LW: NR | Tier 2 (up) | W Florida

...Missouri beat Florida...
10 Florida Gators LW: 6 | Tier 2 | L Missouri

...Florida beat Ole Miss...
11 Ole Miss Rebels LW: 7 | Tier 2 | bye

...and Ole Miss beat LSU.
12 Pittsburgh Panthers LW: 21 | Tier 2 (up) | W Virginia Tech
13 Texas Tech Red Raiders LW: 14 | Tier 2 | W Colorado
14 Iowa Hawkeyes LW: 8 | Tier 2 | L Ohio State
15 BYU Cougars LW: 13 | Tier 2 | W Texas Christian
16 Utah Utes LW: 22 | Tier 2 (up) | bye
17 LSU Tigers LW: 10 | Tier 2 | W McNeese

Redoing the tiers finally pushed Clemson down one, and that's still LSU's best win.
18 Oregon Ducks LW: NR | Tier 3 (up) | bye

Redoing tiers from scratch let me move past strictly trying to keep teams behind teams they lost to. Case in point. Yes, Oregon lost to Oklahoma State, but Oklahoma State lost to Tulsa who's not done well the last couple weeks. If one of those losses is inexplicable, both can be.

That said, the Oklahoma State loss is, for now, keeping Oregon out of tier 2.
19 Houston Cougars LW: NR | Tier 3 (up) | W Central Florida
20 Oklahoma State Cowboys LW: NR | Tier 3 (up) | bye
21 USC Trojans LW: NR | Tier 3 (up) | W Washington
22 Wake Forest Demon Deacons LW: 15 | Tier 3 | W Wake Forest
23 Wisconsin Badgers LW: 16 | Tier 3 | W Michigan State
24 Minnesota Golden Gophers LW: NR | Tier 3 (up) | W Michigan
25 UCLA Bruins LW: NR | Tier 3 (up) | bye

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