IdaGriz01
Well-known member
Well, let’s put the depression behind us and look ahead instead. A total of seven ranked teams lost over the weekend, some of them very bad losses. (No, I do not consider the Griz loss a “bad loss” because it was on the road to another ranked team, and 10 points is not a terrible margin.)
Guess, Team, (Record), [Current Rank]
#1 Jacksonville St (2-1) [1]
#2 Coastal Carolina (3-0) [2]
#3 NDSU (2-1) [4]
#4 Illinois State (2-1) [5]
#5 Villanova (2-1) [6]
#6 South Dakota State (2-0) [7]
#7 Northern Iowa (2-1) [9]
#8 Chattanooga (2-1) [10]
#9 James Madison (3-0) [12]
#10 EWU (1-2) [14]
#11 Liberty (2-1) [15]
#12 Montana (1-2) [8]
#13 SHSU (0-2) [3]
#14 YSU (2-1) [16]
#15 Montana State (1-1) [11]
#16 Fordham (2-1) [18]
#17 Portland State (2-0) [19]
#18 Eastern Kentucky (1-1) [21]
#19 New Hampshire (1-2) [13]
#20 Richmond (2-1) [22]
#21 Indiana St (2-1) [23]
#22 SE Louisiana (2-1) [20]
#23 McNeese State (2-0) [NR]
#24 Cal Poly (1-2) [17]
#25 Harvard (1-0) [25]
NR NAU (2-1) [24]
First example of a bad loss: #3 Sam Houston State losing at home to unranked Lamar (Lamar received all of 12 points in the previous STATS poll.) They did stage a comeback from a big halftime deficit, so the final loss was just by a FG. My personal preference would be to drop them from the top-25 altogether, since they are now 0-2. However, these guesses are about what the pollsters will do, not my personal views. I do not ever recall seeing the pollsters dropping a team from high in the top-10 all the way out of the poll. So I basically slammed them with double the normal penalty for a loss instead.
#13 New Hampshire also lost to an unranked team (Stony Brook got just 2 votes in the last poll). They were on the road, but the margin was 25 points … not so good. Anyway, I nudged them down a bit more than the normal formula just because of that.
The final bad loss was the monster blowout put on NAU by Arizona. Of course, no one expected a close game, but losing by 64 points is major ugly. Arizona gained almost 800 yards in total offense (more than doubling up on NAU), even though the Lumberjacks “won” the time of possession battle, 36 minutes to 24. But actually, NAU was on thin ice sitting at #24 anyway … only a close final score could keep them in the top-25.
I replaced NAU with McNeese, the #26 vote-getter in the last poll. Easy call, IMO.
One final point: I hit Cal Poly harder than I normally would after a 2-TD loss to another ranked team. That was partly because they did lose at home, but mostly because the pollsters simply “don’t like” the Mustangs. I hope I’m wrong on that one.
Guess, Team, (Record), [Current Rank]
#1 Jacksonville St (2-1) [1]
#2 Coastal Carolina (3-0) [2]
#3 NDSU (2-1) [4]
#4 Illinois State (2-1) [5]
#5 Villanova (2-1) [6]
#6 South Dakota State (2-0) [7]
#7 Northern Iowa (2-1) [9]
#8 Chattanooga (2-1) [10]
#9 James Madison (3-0) [12]
#10 EWU (1-2) [14]
#11 Liberty (2-1) [15]
#12 Montana (1-2) [8]
#13 SHSU (0-2) [3]
#14 YSU (2-1) [16]
#15 Montana State (1-1) [11]
#16 Fordham (2-1) [18]
#17 Portland State (2-0) [19]
#18 Eastern Kentucky (1-1) [21]
#19 New Hampshire (1-2) [13]
#20 Richmond (2-1) [22]
#21 Indiana St (2-1) [23]
#22 SE Louisiana (2-1) [20]
#23 McNeese State (2-0) [NR]
#24 Cal Poly (1-2) [17]
#25 Harvard (1-0) [25]
NR NAU (2-1) [24]
First example of a bad loss: #3 Sam Houston State losing at home to unranked Lamar (Lamar received all of 12 points in the previous STATS poll.) They did stage a comeback from a big halftime deficit, so the final loss was just by a FG. My personal preference would be to drop them from the top-25 altogether, since they are now 0-2. However, these guesses are about what the pollsters will do, not my personal views. I do not ever recall seeing the pollsters dropping a team from high in the top-10 all the way out of the poll. So I basically slammed them with double the normal penalty for a loss instead.
#13 New Hampshire also lost to an unranked team (Stony Brook got just 2 votes in the last poll). They were on the road, but the margin was 25 points … not so good. Anyway, I nudged them down a bit more than the normal formula just because of that.
The final bad loss was the monster blowout put on NAU by Arizona. Of course, no one expected a close game, but losing by 64 points is major ugly. Arizona gained almost 800 yards in total offense (more than doubling up on NAU), even though the Lumberjacks “won” the time of possession battle, 36 minutes to 24. But actually, NAU was on thin ice sitting at #24 anyway … only a close final score could keep them in the top-25.
I replaced NAU with McNeese, the #26 vote-getter in the last poll. Easy call, IMO.
One final point: I hit Cal Poly harder than I normally would after a 2-TD loss to another ranked team. That was partly because they did lose at home, but mostly because the pollsters simply “don’t like” the Mustangs. I hope I’m wrong on that one.
