2020 Couch Power 10, Week 6
Last week, 5 more ranked teams in college football lost, a whopping 4 of them to unranked teams. Apart from that, I'm not going to spend too much time breaking down the previous week of football, because there are bigger things (namely, the Presidential Election) to worry about right now. And it has NOTHING to do with North Carolina being one of those 4 aforementioned teams!
Just a reminder that this is not a definitive ranking on how good the teams are, or on who I think will be/deserves to be in the playoff at the end of the year. Rather, it's more of a "What if preseason rankings and bigwig bias didn't predetermine the top teams" kind of thing, an ideal ranking of the country's teams based on what they've actually proved on the field to date:
1. Alabama
Alabama had somewhat of an uneven start to the season, but boy, what a few weeks they've had. After pulling away from Georgia in the highest-profile matchup of the year thus far, they've followed up by beating Tennessee and Mike Leach's pesky Mississippi State by a combined 72 points.
2. Cincinnati
No, I do not think Cincinnati is legitimately a better team than Clemson at this point. But while the latter has had a shaky couple of weeks, Cincy has dispatched of the two toughest teams on their schedule with absolute ease, following up their 30-point road win over #16 SMU with a 40-point win over Memphis. This #2 ranking is a celebration of the Bearcats' form.
3. Clemson
That Clemson was still able to gut out a come-from-behind win against a sneaky good Boston College without their star quarterback Trevor Lawrence is more of a credit to their quality than a knock on it. But what is concerning for Tigers fans is that this is the second straight shoddy performance against inferior competition, and though Lawrence's absence would be a valid excuse, backup QB D.J. Uiagalelei was hardly the problem against Boston College.
4. BYU
Another week, another dominant BYU victory. This time, they dispatched easily of a subpar Western Kentucky squad. It was a rare respite from an otherwise impressive slate of opponents, but that respite won't last long: Boise State awaits on Friday.
5. Ohio State
You may recall, I was not sold on Ohio State after just one (arguably unimpressive) win over Nebraska. That changed with their Saturday night domination of Penn State. To be fair, I'm still not completely sold on Penn State's quality, either, but for the Buckeyes to boss them around so comprehensively on both sides of the ball speaks to their potential to be an elite team.
6. Indiana
Indiana's season-opening upset would have aged better were Penn State to stun Ohio State, but it still holds up as a good win. And the fact that they followed that up with a convincing win over a surprisingly decent Rutgers team adds to the Hoosiers' credibility.
7. Coastal Carolina
Coastal Carolina continues their Cinderella run in the Couch Power 10, and arguably more importantly, in the race for a New Year's Six Bowl. The Sun Belt schedule gives them very few opportunities to make a splash, but a 51-0 win over Georgia State shows their staying power.
8. Marshall
Marshall continues their Cinderella run in the Couch Power 10, and arguably more importantly, in the race for a New Year's Six Bowl. The Conference-USA schedule gives them very few opportunities to make a splash, but a well-aging win over Appalachian State shows their staying power.
9. Notre Dame
Between last week's shellacking of Pittsburgh, and this past weekend's comfortable win over Georgia Tech, it's safe to say Notre Dame has rounded into form. Unfortunately for their Couch Power 10 stock, they still have a grand total of zero wins over teams with winning records. However, they've got quite the opportunity to overturn that, with #1 Clemson coming to town this weekend.
10. Wisconsin
In a week in which Wisconsin's 2nd and 3rd games were cancelled due to a rash of COVID cases in their team, they could probably use some good news. So here's some: with so many ranked teams losing last weekend, their 1-0 record (with a commanding 38-point win) suddenly looks pretty good, and they move into our Top 10 by default.
Just missed: Boise State, Georgia, Texas A&M, Florida, Miami, Sam "Best QB Not Named Trevor" Howell
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