AP’s Top 25 rankings are out for week six and there are a few new faces this week headed by Kentucky, making it Seven SEC teams ranked now. The top two remained as was with both Alabama & Georgia winning with ease against ranked opposition. Their SEC opponents didn’t slide too far after their losses, emphasising just how well regarded the top two are.
The Big Ten now has the other two playoff places with IOWA jumping into the no 3 slot thanks to a big Friday Night Road win. Penn State was slotted in just behind them probably on a form line through Indiana who both have beaten.
Overall Iowa’s resume does look slightly better at this stage and the stage is set for the two’s meeting this weekend. The winner will be hard to dislodge from the playoffs, barring a shock loss.
Oklahoma slipped again despite continuing to eke out wins. We guess the voters are sick of these one score victories. They have the chance at redemption this week though when they travel to the Cotton Bowl to take on arch-rivals Texas.
Cinncinati’s excellent defensive performance moved them to No. 5, although they have only played four games. They are 29 point favourites this weekend against Temple so it will be interesting to see if they stay here without a blowout win.
New Entries
There were five changes in the Top 25 with three new faces and a couple of returners. Kentucky were the biggest movers jumping straight in at No 16 thanks to their great win over Florida. The fact they have scraped one-score wins in their last four games is probably why they are not a bit higher. If they can get past LSU this week it will set up an interesting clash with Georgia. Win that one and they would be top 4.
The other New Entries were San Diego State who slightly surprisingly got the nod following a beat down on an FCS team and SMU who are 5-0 with a nice win against TCU on their resume.
Both Texas & ASU were welcomed back as neither team’s solitary loss was as bad as it may have looked at the time.
Gone But For How Long
The one glaring omission from the list is Clemson, who may be 3-2 but those losses were to No2 Georgia and No 23 NC State and both were close. No disrespect to either SMU or SDSU but they would both be multi-score underdogs against the Tigers.
Bubbling Under
Unless Clemson does something silly like lose to Syracuse this week they will no doubt be back in, however, we also like the look of Mississippi State who are also 3-2 but their losses were for a combined 5 points and they showed a lot of grit in beating Texas A&M last week. We would also like to see UTSA get a look in if they keep winning. They are 5-0 and that includes good wins over Memphis & Illinois.
Anyway nitpicking aside the rankings are below and they are a pretty good reflection of the season so far.
AP Top 25 Week Six
1 Alabama 5-0
2 Georgia 5-0
3 Iowa 5-0
4 Penn State 5-0
5 Cincinnati 4-0
6 Oklahoma 5-0
7 Ohio State 4-1
8 Oregon 4-1
9 Michigan 5-0
10 BYU 5-0
11 Michigan State 5-0
12 Oklahoma State 5-0
13 Arkansas 4-1
14 Notre Dame 4-1
15 Coastal Carolina 5-0
16 Kentucky 5-0
17 Ole Miss 3-1
18 Auburn 4-1
19 Wake Forest 5-0
20 Florida 3-2
21 Texas 4-1
22 Arizona State 4-1
23 NC State 4-1
24 SMU 5-0
25 San Diego State 4-0
You can check last weeks rankings here
