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2016 TipTop 25 Week Twelve

Welcome back to the college football ranking system that began with a preseason top 25 that was based solely on picking teams at random out of a hat, as shown above. You can see that UNLV was selected first, thereby securing our preseason #1 slot, but in week two they were drubbed 42-21 at unranked UCLA, ending their brief stay at the top.

As the games are played, I am also ranking teams completely blind to their histories and "name" value, so that their rankings are based only on what they do this season and, to a lesser degree each week, on where they were ranked in the preseason. Eventually, where they were ranked in the preseason should have little or no impact on their current rankings.

All FBS teams are treated the same here, but this ranking assumes that FCS teams are a level below, and therefore it is unacceptable for a ranked FBS team to struggle with an FCS team, let alone lose. On the other hand, beating an FCS team, regardless of how "impressive" the score, means nothing and is treated the same as though the winner did not play a game at all.

Alabama Still #1

Alabama had not been ranked in our preseason top 50, but they opened the season with a 52-6 win over Southern Cal (#13 in the preseason), moving them into our week 1 rankings at #13, and at this point they have beaten 6 teams in our current top 27, with only one of their 11 wins even being close (touchdown or less). This week they won 31-3 over Chattanooga.

Top 25 After Week Twelve Games

After the storm of upsets we saw a couple of weeks ago, this week seemed rather calm and stable: only 4 teams from last week's top 25 were upset by lower-ranked teams over the weekend. Naturally, while last time out we saw a huge reshuffling of our top 25, this week our top 25 sees very little change. This week's TipTop 25 is as follows:

	Team	Record	LW	This Week's Result
#1	Alabama	11-0	1	Won 31-3 over Chattanooga
#2	Michigan	10-1	2	Won 20-10 over Indiana
#3	Colorado	9-2	6	Won 38-24 over #42 Washington State
#4	Clemson	10-1	3	Won 35-13 at Wake Forest
#5	Louisville	9-2	4	Lost 36-10 at #17 Houston
#6	Southern Cal	8-3	7	Won 36-14 at UCLA
#7	Washington	10-1	8	Won 44-18 over Arizona State
#8	Stanford	8-3	9	Won 45-31 at California
#9	Western Michigan	11-0	5	Won 38-0 over Buffalo
#10	Utah	8-3	10	Lost 30-28 to unrated Oregon
#11	Penn State	9-2	11	Won 39-0 at Rutgers
#12	Ohio State	10-1	12	Won 17-16 at Michigan State
#13	Wisconsin	9-2	13	Won 49-20 over Purdue
#14	Florida State	8-3	14	Won 45-14 at Syracuse
#15	South Florida	9-2	15	Won 35-27 at Southern Methodist
#16	Navy	8-2	16	Won 66-31 at East Carolina
#17	Houston	9-2	17	Won 36-10 over #4 Louisville
#18	Tulsa	8-3	18	Won 35-20 at Central Florida
#19	Oklahoma	9-2	19	Won 56-28 at #37 West Virginia
#20	Nebraska	9-2	20	Won 28-7 over Maryland
#21	Texas A&M	8-3	21	Won 23-10 over Texas-San Antonio
#22	Auburn	8-3	22	Won 55-0 over Alabama A&M
#23	Louisiana State	6-4	23	Lost 16-10 to #28 Florida
#24	Arkansas	7-4	24	Won 58-42 at Mississippi State
#25	Tennessee	8-3	27	Won 63-37 over Missouri

Notes on Changes to This Week's Top 25

As noted, 4 teams were upset by lower-ranked teams this week, but those teams don't move much in this week's ratings because so many of our other rated teams have suffered upset losses themselves in previous weeks. Louisville, ranked #4 last week, was smashed 36-10 by #17 Houston, but Louisville falls just one spot in this week's ratings, and Houston doesn't move up at all. Why is that? Well, this was Louisville's first upset loss, whereas the team ranked behind them this week, Southern Cal, has already taken a couple of upset losses.

As for Houston, this upset win over Louisville just makes up for Houston's ugly 38-16 upset loss at Southern Methodist earlier in the season. 9-2 Houston still lost to 8-2 Navy, who therefore remains ranked ahead of the Cougars at #16. Navy, by the way, has previously taken a loss to #15 South Florida, who was stomped by #14 Florida State, who was stomped by Louisville. And that is why Houston doesn't simply move up ahead of Louisville this week.

Western Michigan was adjusted downward because they have not played a team that is even close to the top 25, or even a top 50, and it's getting too late in the season to keep forgiving that. Effectively, 11-0 WMU is still 0-0.

Colorado was adjusted upward primarily because of their high preseason ranking (#4), but also because their performance has been improving down the stretch. Furthermore, beating red-hot Washington State (8-3) by more than a touchdown this week gives Colorado a second quality win (the other was at 8-3 Stanford in October).

Close to the Top 25

The following teams are next in line to be ranked:

#26 Florida
#27 Mississippi
#28 Memphis
#29 Georgia
#30 North Carolina
#31 Virginia Tech
#32 Pittsburgh
#33 Miami (Florida)
#34 Georgia Tech
#35 Temple
#36 Oklahoma State
#37 West Virginia
#38 Boise State
#39 Washington State
#40 Kansas State
#41 Wyoming
#42 Air Force
#43 San Diego State
#44 Troy
#45 Appalachian State

End of the TipTop 25

The point of this top 25 has been an experiment with random preseason ratings and with trying to ignore teams' name values. Ideally, after next week's games the preseason ratings should mean very little, so this will be my last top 25. Starting next week, I'll be doing what I normally do after Thanksgiving, which is commenting on the AP poll top 25 each week until I fix the final AP poll top 25 in January.

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