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dukemetoo Ballot for 2026 Week 8

Ballot Type: Human

Submitted: Oct. 20, 2026, 10:20 a.m.

Overall Rationale: All Human Baby!!

26. LSU
27. North Dakota State
28. Texas
29. Oregon
30. North Carolina

Also, including my non P4 top 15

1. James Madison
2. Boise State
3. Oregon State
4. New Mexico
5. North Dakota State
6. Western Michigan
7. UTSA
8. Liberty
9. Air Force
10. Memphis
11. Louisiana Tech
12. Jacksonville State
13. Ohio
14. South Alabama
15. Louisiana Monroe

I guess I should share my methodology since I am part of the poll now. Here is my current methodology. It will change as I mature, gain more experience, etc. For now though, this is my methodology.

My method changes as the season progresses, but it is all a human poll. Preseason is purely speculative, as in, who would be favored on a neutral field. The team that I think is hypothetically better will get the better ranking. Early on this is recruiting ranking, talent retained, etc.

Slowly through the season, I add in more weight to the resume. When teams have played 5 games, is when I weigh expectations and resume equally. I also view 9 games played as the marker when resume will have 100% weight, and expectations have none.

By resume, I try to look purely at how difficult I think providing that resume would be. This takes into account strength of schedule and margin of victory. I tend to favor consistent teams over streaky ones. In practice, that means I punish teams with bad losses more than teams that don't have good wins. I also do not take head-to-head into consideration. I look hard at the resume if the team's name was missing.

I also try to "overreact" a bit when it comes to rankings. While I try to be fair, if a team gets a bad loss, if I struggle where to put them between 2 spots, I will end up putting them lower. The reason is, I am scared of poll momentum being a crutch, where teams just stay where they are. Moving them forces me to get out of the rut, and actually analyze them.

One other quirk I have is, I believe winning is hard. Any team that is 5-0 or better will be ranked. It causes some silly rankings that first week, but I think it is important. Mainly because if forces me to pay attention to smaller schools.

I'm also leaving notes on games I watched, or have significant opinions. I won't try to guess on explanations where I have no real opinion.

Rank Team Reason
1 BYU Cougars BYU is undefeated, and has the best resume of undefeated teams.
2 Ohio State Buckeyes I really considered dropping them with the Sayin injury. For me to do that, it would mean giving a team with a top 5 win a drop, which I tried, but I couldn't do. Ohio State may drop if they squeak by lesser teams, but right now, this is the correct spot
3 UCLA Bruins Better resume than Utah.
4 Utah Utes Schedule has been weak so far for them, but the games haven't been close other than this Colorado game.
5 Georgia Bulldogs
6 Indiana Hoosiers
7 Miami Hurricanes I only saw the last quarter/OT of the game against Florida State. I didn't see much that was really impressive. I get that it feels bad to drop this team from 2 to 8 with a win, but this was a near loss to Florida State, and their schedule has been the easiest of top 10 teams. I still think they have huge talent, and can compete with anyone, but I think they were overrated previously.
8 Texas Tech Red Raiders Other than Houston, they haven't played a tough schedule. However, they have won every game convincingly, with a smacking of Arizona State this week. Their only remaining challenges are Arizona and Oklahoma State. They have a real opportunity to make it undefeated.
9 Ole Miss Rebels
10 Tennessee Volunteers
11 Notre Dame Fighting Irish Very weak schedule, and they lost their only tough game of the year.
12 Iowa Hawkeyes
13 SMU Mustangs
14 James Madison Dukes
15 Alabama Crimson Tide
16 USC Trojans
17 Kentucky Wildcats
18 Boise State Broncos
19 Houston Cougars
20 Northwestern Wildcats
21 Arizona Wildcats
22 Wake Forest Demon Deacons
23 Oregon State Beavers This team has a G6 schedule, and has two losses, but I can't NOT rank them. They have an explosive offense that needs to be seen. They are my pick for G6 spot right now. They will need to win convincingly, because James Madison will likely be undefeated, and 2 losses is a lot to swallow.
24 New Mexico Lobos
25 Oklahoma State Cowboys

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