| Rank | Team | Delta |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Southern Cal |  3 |
| 2 | Georgia |  1 |
| 3 | Oklahoma | 1 |
| 4 | Florida | 1 |
| 5 | Missouri | 1 |
| 6 | East Carolina | 2 |
| 7 | South Florida | 14 |
| 8 | Wisconsin | 7 |
| 9 | Alabama | 8 |
| 10 | Oregon | 5 |
| 11 | Penn State | 3 |
| 12 | Texas | 1 |
| 13 | Auburn | 4 |
| 14 | LSU | 4 |
| 15 | Brigham Young | 1 |
| 16 | Wake Forest | 2 |
| 17 | Utah | 3 |
| 18 | TCU | 8 |
| 19 | Vanderbilt | 5 |
| 20 | North Carolina | 6 |
| 21 | Oklahoma State | 2 |
| 22 | Texas Tech | 1 |
| 23 | Virginia Tech | 3 |
| 24 | Georgia Tech | 2 |
| 25 | Ohio State | 18 |
Dropped Out: Fresno State (#12), California (#13), Kansas (#22), UCLA (#25).
The breakdown:
1-5: I'd steeled myself entering last Saturday to leave Georgia at the top even in the (inevitable) event USC won, but the dominance of the Trojan win combined with the Dawgs' getting outgained by an offensively iffy 'Cocks outfit means I'm falling in line, too, dammit. I don't honestly trust Missouri this high with their defense--if Louisiana-Lafayette can do a better job of stopping Illinois than you can, you have issues--but until they're seriously challenged, here they go.
6-10: Each of these teams have a quality scalp of some kind. ECU stays out in front via the accrued value of the Va. Tech win, 'Bama's held back by the sloppy Tulane performance, Oregon was meh at better-looking-than-I-expected Purdue, and USF and Wisky fall in-between.
11-14: None of these teams have beaten anyone of substance, but Penn St. has rather obviously looked the best in the process. Auburn's offensive issues keep them behind Texas but that all three of their wins have been over better teams than either LSU have faced keeps them in front of the Bayou Bengals.
15-20: Other teams with decent resumes but probably not the brute strength to justify ranking ahead of the 11-14 group, led by BYU after the UCLA annihilation. TCU looks quite the underrated team to me; they choked the life out of the same New Mexico team that beat Arizona and shoulda-woulda-coulda beaten Texas A&M. Vandy would rank bit higher if their victories hadn't come with a certain degree of good fortune involved.
21-22: Wake me up when you play somebody. The Red Raiders' 60-yard deficit to Nevada looks even less excusable given the way Missouri obliterated the Wolf Pack Saturday.
23-24: The first one-loss teams to make the JCCW's ballot, doing so via better victories (at Boston College, vs. Ga. Tech) than any other one-loss contenders (Fresno St., Ole Miss, Tennessee).
25: Man, did I want to kick the Buckeyes all the way off the ballot. When your greatest accomplishments after three games are "beat Ohio by 12 points after they handed us five turnovers" and "didn't lose as badly to USC as Virginia did," you probably don't deserve to be in the top 25. But then again, none of the undefeated teams still out there (Notre Dame, Kentucky, Florida St., Iowa, Tulsa, Boise St., etc.) have done anything of substance, either, and the other one-loss teams just still aren't really Ohio St.'s physical equals. (Though I'd still have Fresno here, FWIW, if Rutgers hadn't looked so utterly awful against UNC.)
One other note: If you are not a dedicated follower of the BlogPoll, you may have missed that the Auburner took home last week's Coulter-Krugman Award, given to (roughly) the week's biggest homer vote and a consistent harbinger of doom for the blogger's affiliated team. And lo, after smiting Michigan St. Week 1 and Boston College Week 2, so the CK Award last Saturday reduced the Auburn offense to cinders and turned the Tigers into the butt of many a national joke, sparing us the ignominy of a loss only because, one can only assume, the Auburner is awesome. So fear not, friends: last week's aberration was not schematic failure or poor execution, but merely the blog gods waxing wroth, and their expended fury should move on to other unfortunate teams this week. Unless, verily, the Auburner votes the Tigers fifth again, which seemed reasonable at the time but this week will very well leave us, as the scribes would say, screwed.
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