2014 NCAA Football Thread

[pianoknight]

I am officially 0-3 at Memorial Stadium in Lincoln, NE. But, I am also a solid 1-0 at Memorial Stadium in Champaign, IL. But, my overall record of 1-3 is nothing to be proud of

October 3, 2009: Penn State 35 - 17 Illinois

November 9, 2009: Oklahoma 3 - 10 Nebraska

November 10, 2012: Penn State 23 - 32 Nebraska

October 25, 2014: Rutgers 24 - 42 Nebraska

Maybe the universe is telling you you're rooting for the wrong team.

Or it's still mad about McCloskey's Patch.

[Webfooter]

There's been a "Seven Win Sark" sighting inside Marina Del Rey.

It was only a matter of time before that guy showed up again. I'm now just waiting for the "We're still young" line from Sark.

[DCarp1231]

New Top 4 will most likely be

1. Mississippi State

2. Florida State

3. Alabama *cringes*

4. Auburn

[pianoknight]

New Top 4 will most likely be

1. Mississippi State

2. Florida State

3. Alabama *cringes*

4. Auburn

You mean the AP Top 4, which is irrelevant this week since the playoff rankings come out Tuesday. Hoping they'll bring some sense to this whole SEC-boner that the media has.

[HedleyLamarr]

New Top 4 will most likely be

1. Mississippi State

2. Florida State

3. Alabama *cringes*

4. Auburn

You mean the AP Top 4, which is irrelevant this week since the playoff rankings come out Tuesday. Hoping they'll bring some sense to this whole SEC-boner that the media has.

Not sure if the playoff rankings will differ that much from the other polls. Until every game is played, each poll is just a rolling, incomplete body of work.

My guess is that two SEC teams will be in the initial top 4. I also think Oregon slides up to #4.

#1 Mississippi State vs #4 Oregon

#2 Florida State vs #3 Auburn

MSU gets the top seed due to who they've played to date, while FSU gets the #2 spot due to being undefeated. Auburn gets the nod over Alabama due to their loss being to undefeated MSU, and Oregon gets in with their win over Michigan State earlier in the season. Auburn gets bumped up to the 3-slot to avoid an intra-conference matchup in the national semis.

I do think the committee will do their very best to avoid a conference getting two teams in, but you can't argue that, for the time being, Michigan State gets a bid over Auburn. Nor can you say that Michigan State is above Alabama...if anything, they're equals.

[pianoknight]

New Top 4 will most likely be

1. Mississippi State

2. Florida State

3. Alabama *cringes*

4. Auburn

You mean the AP Top 4, which is irrelevant this week since the playoff rankings come out Tuesday. Hoping they'll bring some sense to this whole SEC-boner that the media has.

Not sure if the playoff rankings will differ that much from the other polls. Until every game is played, each poll is just a rolling, incomplete body of work.

My guess is that two SEC teams will be in the initial top 4. I also think Oregon slides up to #4.

#1 Mississippi State vs #4 Oregon

#2 Florida State vs #3 Auburn

MSU gets the top seed due to who they've played to date, while FSU gets the #2 spot due to being undefeated. Auburn gets the nod over Alabama due to their loss being to undefeated MSU, and Oregon gets in with their win over Michigan State earlier in the season. Auburn gets bumped up to the 3-slot to avoid an intra-conference matchup in the national semis.

I do think the committee will do their very best to avoid a conference getting two teams in, but you can't argue that, for the time being, Michigan State gets a bid over Auburn. Nor can you say that Michigan State is above Alabama...if anything, they're equals.

And if they're equal, the committee defaults to picking teams from other conferences instead of front-loading on the SEC.

Time and again, they've said that the committee will put a higher emphasis on conference champions. Right now we have no idea how heavy that weighting will be, but I would not be shocked if they included only the SEC Champ by season's end. Let's not forget that Alabama has yet to play MSU or Auburn. It's not a stretch to think that the Tide beats Auburn, and it MSU stays undefeated then you're left with both Alabama and Auburn as 2-loss teams. I don't care how good the SEC likes to think they are, 2-loss SEC teams don't trump undefeated FSU or 1-loss champs from the ACC, B1G or Pac-12.

[HedleyLamarr]

And if they're equal, the committee defaults to picking teams from other conferences instead of front-loading on the SEC.

Time and again, they've said that the committee will put a higher emphasis on conference champions. Right now we have no idea how heavy that weighting will be, but I would not be shocked if they included only the SEC Champ by season's end. Let's not forget that Alabama has yet to play MSU or Auburn. It's not a stretch to think that the Tide beats Auburn, and it MSU stays undefeated then you're left with both Alabama and Auburn as 2-loss teams. I don't care how good the SEC likes to think they are, 2-loss SEC teams don't trump undefeated FSU or 1-loss champs from the ACC, B1G or Pac-12.

What we have here....is a failure to communicate.

What I'm telling you is that the polls, and very likely the committee, are ranking the teams based off of what's happened the first 9 weeks of the season. What you're talking about is what might happen. Polls don't work that way.

Since we don't have any conference champions right now (hate to break that news to you), there's no other way you can make the rankings other than "Which four have looked the best so far". No matter how you look at it, Mississippi State and Florida State are going to be 1-2 (the order not mattering much).

We then have a quartet of Alabama, Auburn, Michigan State, and Oregon as being the near-consensus 3-6. Looking at their 1-loss opponent and their wins, this is where you start to have the BCS-like arguments. First, put up Alabama vs. Auburn (since they're in the same conference)...Auburn lost to #1 MSU, Alabama lost to #7-8-ish Ole Miss. To this point, Auburn's got the edge on Alabama based on who they lost to and who've they've beaten.

Now, put Auburn in the pool with Oregon and Michigan State. Obviously, Oregon can be no lower than second in this group of 3 since they beat Michigan State...no way can you put 1-loss MSU over 1-loss Oregon. Then, if you compare Auburn and Michigan State, Auburn's resume currently tops MSU.

So, Auburn and Oregon would be the 3 and 4 seeds. Ranking them won't matter since the committee would likely avoid having intraconference matchups in the national semis. (Similar to how the seeds get determined in the NCAA Tournament...a team may be a 3-seed, but gets dropped to a 4-seed or bumped up to a 2-seed to avoid a matchup.)

Those what-if scenarios are nice to think about, but aren't really relevant until the games get played and the teams win/lose games. Sure, Alabama and Auburn both might have two losses. Mississippi State might lose a game. I might come home to my girlfriend and Manuela Arbelaez naked in bed and making out. Don't get worked up over the first poll and what perceived biases there might be in the committee. Doesn't mean much right now other than an up-to-the-moment barometer.

[pianoknight]

I actually agree with your line of thinking.

Personally, I'd prefer we just abolished preseason rankings and didn't even have polls until mid-October when the playoff rankings are unveiled. But, ESPN needs something to sell and an otherwise quirky Oregon-Michigan State game can suddenly be "must-see-TV" if it's a Top 10 match up.

You're right - polls are a gauge of where we are now, not a prediction of what's to come. What kills me more than anything is not the polls themselves, but how the media uses them to create self-fulfilling prophecies. For example, a highly ranked SEC team loses to another SEC team. The winner rises tremendously (see: LSU) due to a win over a "mighty, mighty SEC team," while the loser (Ole Miss) may or may not plummet that much because, after all, they did lose to a mighty, mighty SEC team. But flip that logic to the ACC, B1G or Pac-12 and suddenly Lou Holtz is talking about how terrible the conference is because they all beat up on each other.

I think that allowing the committee members to have varying methods of ranking their personal Top 25 - and then hashing it out - is probably best. It accounts for all types: margin of victory, strength of schedule, statistical analysis, eyeball tests, signature wins, rival wins, star power, non-conference record and so forth. I'm very excited for the initial playoff rankings and think it should be interesting to see how this season plays out.

[HedleyLamarr]

I think the pollsters have done a good job of "market correction" when it comes to preseason polls and going week-to-week for the last few years. Mississippi State went from unranked to #1 in like five weeks. Teams have dropped in the polls despite winning. A team like South Florida went from unranked to #2 in a few weeks' time not too long ago.

I can't give these voters too much flak for compiling a list of the top 25 teams when you've got 120+ to choose from, these teams hardly coming close to playing comparable schedules, and with the bottom half of the poll being filled with teams that are pretty interchangeable .

[CLEstones]

You're right - polls are a gauge of where we are now, not a prediction of what's to come. What kills me more than anything is not the polls themselves, but how the media uses them to create self-fulfilling prophecies. For example, a highly ranked SEC team loses to another SEC team. The winner rises tremendously (see: LSU) due to a win over a "mighty, mighty SEC team," while the loser (Ole Miss) may or may not plummet that much because, after all, they did lose to a mighty, mighty SEC team. But flip that logic to the ACC, B1G or Pac-12 and suddenly Lou Holtz is talking about how terrible the conference is because they all beat up on each other.

I've said this for a few years now. Yes, the SEC is the best conference, but the way they make it seem that its the SEC and then everybody else is a joke. I have been looking through Bowl Records comparing the B1G with the SEC from the last few years... and I don't think the gap is that large.

If you looking strictly at head-to-head between the B1G and SEC, yes, the SEC is dominant in the win-loss percentage. However, just like stats, win-loss records lie. Over the last 2 years, many of the B1G teams have either been leading late, or kept the game competitive the entire game (yes, there are exceptions with blow outs). However, there have been numerous cases where middle of the road B1G teams have been competitive with middle of the road SEC teams... except that the SEC teams would be ranked... but the B1G schools would be considered a lot worse, thus attributing to down years from the B1G/other conferences.

I don't give them TOO much flack either, but when I see team's like Marshal ranked instead of Iowa, I tend to questions it. By no means is Iowa a Top 25 team, and I would even give Marshal the advantage head to head on a neutral site ONE time... but Marshal playing a weekly schedule of Mid-American teams is a lot different than playing B1G team week in and week out.

[HedleyLamarr]

If you looking strictly at head-to-head between the B1G and SEC, yes, the SEC is dominant in the win-loss percentage. However, just like stats, win-loss records lie. Over the last 2 years, many of the B1G teams have either been leading late, or kept the game competitive the entire game (yes, there are exceptions with blow outs).

There aren't many stats that I keep up with, but wins/losses are pretty accurate. Never seen a result that lied to me after 60 minutes of play.

[BengalsJunkie]

I thought they were going to be stupid enough to leave Marshall in

[PSUcelticsWON95]

4 of the top 6 in the Playoff poll are from the SEC... Yep, knew it was gonna be highly controversial.

Playoff:

1. Mississippi State (Agree)

2. Florida State (Agree)

3. Auburn (Killed LSU, lost to Mississippi State, but going to have to disagree)

4. Ole Miss (Beat by LSU, disagree)

5. Oregon (Knew they were going to choke sometime, but at least they did it early. I'd put them in the playoff)

6. Alabama (Best team in SEC, in my opinion. I'd put them in)

All the SEC schools are just going to beat each other. We'll (hopefully) only end up with one or two in the Playoff.

[Still MIGHTY]

Yeah, I wouldn't take the top four as straight playoff matchups right now, especially because by the end of it the four SEC West schools (MSU, Ole Miss, Auburn, Alabama) are going to knock each other around, knocking out at least two of them. This is simply their rankings.

TCU at #7 ahead of Michigan State at #8 is surprising (and se spots ahead of Baylor who beat TCU) , as is those two and #9 Kansas State ahead of Notre Dame at #10. I think we all kind of devalued Notre Dame a bit, just surprising at how far the Committee dropped them.

But hey, Arizona State at #14. That's cool, I guess.

[PSUcelticsWON95]

I thought they were going to be stupid enough to leave Marshall in

I know their schedule doesn't say so, but I don't think they're too overrated. I mean, they've blown out their opposition in just about every game.

[Raysfan12]

Hey, Louisville is 25th in the rankings (which won't last long when the Cards beat FSU Thursday night!)!

[crashcarson15]

I did something right, apparently.

Some thoughts...

• Think they got it absolutely right with Ole Miss ahead of Alabama.
• Notre Dame doesn't surprise me — there aren't really good wins here. I mean, Stanford and UNC are the two best teams ND's beat and, well, they're not that great. Arizona State and Louisville need to play well the rest of the way, let's put it that way.
• TCU surprises me a bit being ahead of Michigan State and Kansas State.
• Obviously, the committee sees something in Nebraska.

Long, long, long time to go. We've just got a bit of a frame of reference now.

[DS729]

Yeah, they got it right. Ole Miss should be ahead of Alabama no questions asked (although the Tide should probably be ahead of Oregon) and Auburn still has two very good wins at this point in the season (Killing LSU and beating K-State on the road.) And yeah, I don't know what they see in Nebraska, do they beat Ohio State, Utah, Oklahoma, or LSU on a neutral field? Probably not. And I'm not sold on Louisville either, beating up on mid-level ACC teams is about as good as anything Marshall's done to this point.

[Raysfan12]

And I'm not sold on Louisville either, beating up on mid-level ACC teams is about as good as anything Marshall's done to this point.

You do realize that Louisville was 8 points away from being unbeaten. Yes they did beat some mid-level ACC teams, but they have played well despite a new coach, QB, and a totally new conference. And in a neutral field, Louisville would beat Marshall very easily.

[DS729]

And I'm not sold on Louisville either, beating up on mid-level ACC teams is about as good as anything Marshall's done to this point.

You do realize that Louisville was 8 points away from being unbeaten. Yes they did beat some mid-level ACC teams, but they have played well despite a new coach, QB, and a totally new conference. And in a neutral field, Louisville would beat Marshall very easily.

One of those is to Virginia, who is quickly finding the crapper at the same rate the other two teams' in the state are. The Marshall argument is debatable. They may win, but it might not be as "easy" as you think.

But what the heck, odds are they probably won't be in the rankings next week.