Projected college football rankings after Colorado, BYU fall, Penn State slip away

On By Littum

The Big 12 has been delivering mayhem one week at a time, so it was only fair that the two front-runners playing in the late afternoon window, the Colorado Buffaloes and BYU Cougars, would be more of the same. And that’s actually exactly what we saw.

For the Colorado side, they had to go on the road and match up against a Kansas Jayhawks team that had knocked off Iowa State and then handed BYU its first loss in the previous two weeks. With how the Buffs had been playing, the hope was that they could put an end to that. However, they could not. Kansas ran amok, literally, with perfect ball control and limited Colorado’s offense to just 21 points in a 37-21 upset win.

Then there was BYU. While it got pretty hectic late and a Hail Mary attempt fell short, the Cougars fell for the second straight week, this time giving Arizona State the inside track to the Big 12 title game after the Sun Devils picked up the 28-23 victory in Tempe.

We weren’t just limited to Big 12 mayhem though! Penn State was on the road at Minnesota and trailed at halftime. The Golden Gophers then settle for a late field goal to cut the deficit to 26-25, which turned out to be a poor decision by PJ Fleck as the Nittany Lions were able to convert a fourth down and secure the win and escape disaster.

So with that combined with Ohio State beating Indiana and Ole Miss getting upset by Florida, where are we with the projected AP Top 25 ranking? Let’s take a look.

  1. Oregon ducks
  2. Ohio State Buckeyes
  3. Texas Longhorns
  4. Penn State Nittany Lions
  5. Notre Dame Fighting Irish
  6. Alabama Crimson Tide
  7. Georgia Bulldogs
  8. Tennessee Volunteers
  9. Indiana Hoosiers
  10. Miami Hurricanes
  11. Boise State Broncos
  12. SMU Mustangs
  13. Texas A&M Aggies
  14. Arizona State Sun Devils
  15. Ole Miss Rebels
  16. Clemson Tigers
  17. Army Black Knights
  18. BYU Cougars
  19. South Carolina Gamecocks
  20. Tulane Green Wave
  21. Iowa State Cyclones
  22. Colorado buffalo
  23. UNLV Rebels
  24. Illinois battles the Illini
  25. Washington State Cougars

In reality, none of these projections mean much to the Big 12. However, it’s hard not to see Colorado falling out of the Top 20 and BYU flirting with it as well. On the flip side, though, it’s time for AP Top 25 voters to start showing Arizona State some respect and vault them into the Top 15. Penn State won’t be affected, but it continues to make Top 5 looks looks doubtful.

As for the Big 12 teams, however, they were probably already playing for a spot in the College Football Playoff awarded to the conference champion. That hasn’t changed, but it looks like they’ll be a steal without a doubt with the losses to BYU and Colorado.