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AJ_CC Ballot for 2026 Week 8

Ballot Type: Human

Submitted: Oct. 19, 2026, 9 a.m.

Overall Rationale: Well that was a bloodbath.

I hoped writing this out would make things easier for me to decide.

For starters the SEC is going to be the goddam death of me. WHY CAN'T YOU JUST BE NORMAL. If these schools would just beat each other by small margins this would be a lot easier, but all these blowouts are just making a mess. To summarize:

Missppi State's been blown out by LSU and Alabama, but they beat Missouri.
Missouri blew out Florida, but got blown out by Ole Miss
Florida blew out Ole Miss and also beat Texas and Auburn
Auburn and Texas both have big signature wins over Georgia and Ohio State, and Texas over Tennessee, but that loss to Oklahoma is looking pretty bad.
Let's not forget Florida getting blown out by South Carolina.


I can't really justify ranking Missouri and Missipi State after those beatdowns at the hands of Ole Miss and LSU. But I can't justify Auburn and Texas without justifying Florida. And I can't justify Florida without justifying Missouri, and I can't justify Missouri without justifying Mississippi State. B

So these 5 teams are in a very frustrating group (thankfully I can put Ole Miss and LSU slightly above) that I just don't have 25 spots to accommodate. I could just throw them all out for simplicity sake, but I would feel like that would be disingenuous to my process, and methods. I could put all 5 in but that would be unfair to schools I feel deserve spots.

So something had to give somewhere. Ultimately the H2H of my methodology won out (and also despite being more recent the Ole Miss, LSU blowouts aren't as atrocious as South Carolina). So last two spots went to Mississippi State and Missouri, though I would like the record to reflect I don't feel good about my selections. If I removed the H2H and gave everybody identical wins and losses against teams of identical quality, I would probably give these spots to Texas and Auburn, but that's a pointless hypothetical Not for the first time I wish I had 30 spots to give (though then I'd probably start asking for 35).

Others in consideration:
Preformentioned Florida, Texas, Auburn.
James Madison: I feel really bad leaving them out, kind of just a victim of chaos elevating some teams.
Boise State: see above
SMU: Only 1 loss power conference team out at the moment, but their whole season has been a bunch of close games against so-so teams.
Oregon State: They're getting more and more interesting.

Now onto more pleasant things:
BYU is the undefeated team with the best win in the country (despite the controversy). So they're an easy choice. Tech's win over Houston looks better every week so they get the nod over Miami at number 3.

Ohio State's win over Indiana is better than anything Notre Dame has, despite Notre Dame having the better loss. Indiana still has better wins over Notre Dame, so they stay ahead. Georgia dropped slightly below as a result of their signature win looking slightly worse, so not quite on the level of Ohio State's, while their loss is worse than Notre Dame and Indiana's. My rankings are based on what you've done not what you're going to do, so Ohio State doesn't lose anything for Sayin getting injured. Houston jumping into that tier of one loss teams with that win over OK State.

UCLA and Utah still looking for the big wins to jump above the one losses. Oregon without Dante Moore is still looking like a good team, but it isn't quite the huge win it would be for UCLA if he had played.

I was wrong on Tennessee, that win over Alabama was thorough and that close win over Auburn looks a lot better, though that Texas loss looks slightly worse than when it happened.

Arizona and Wake Forrest are looking better and better every week as are those loses to BYU and Miami. USC didn't play, kind of ended up in the perfect storm where teams above them played poorly enough to drop below them while teams below them played poorly enough to drop. Northwestern had a bit of close call but I still appreciate their entire body of work.

Ole Miss has always been a team that's tortured me. Though that big win over Missouri helped assuage my issues, while their win over LSU is also looking better than it did a week ago.

Alabama, their first loss is no longer to the number 1 team in the country, and they were the clearly inferior team against Tennessee so they took a bit of a drop. Still that blowout win over Kentucky keeps them above the Wilcats (whose own win over LSU is looking better). Big win for Oregon over Nebraska, who now have 3 quality wins between them, USC and Boise, though still behind Oklahoma State despite the latter's loss against Houston. Iowa still needs something signature to move up, though looking strong overall.

LSU and Nebraska both coming in with close losses against good team, and big wins elsewhere. Though neither can stomach another loss at this point.


Summary thoughts: did I expect to have 4 Big 12 teams in the top 10 at this point in the season and 5 in the top 12. No I did not but I feel they all deserve it at this point. Did I expect to only have 1 SEC team in the top 10, and the highest ranking one being 7? No I did not, though I do expect that change in the coming weeks. Someone in that Ole Miss, Alabama, Kentucky, LSU group is going to emerge at some point though I'm a little more doubtful about that Mississippi State, Missouri, Florida, Texas, Auburn group.

So I guess at this point my playoff bracket would be:

UCLA@Houston vs BYU
James Madison@Indiana vs Ohio State
Utah@Georgia vs Texas Tech
Tennesee@Notre Dame vs Miami

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