GopherHole.com Top 25 (9-10-06)

If you’ve seen my past two polls this season you’ll notice that I didn’t have Ohio State or Notre Dame ranked as high as most others did. I was a believer in both teams offenses, but I was not quite as convinced on each teams defense. Ohio State was still untested with their 9 new starters, and Notre Dame just did not have a good defense last year and I wanted to see something big from them this season before jumping on their bandwagon.

Well, after what transpired this past weekend consider me a believer. Ohio State’s defense shut down a Texas offense that over the past few years has been as good as anyone in the nation. Up in South Bend, Notre Dame silenced Penn State’s young offensive stars, holding them to 3 points in the first 3 quaters on their way to a 41-17 victory. With those two impressive performances Ohio State jumps up to #1 and Notre Dame to #4 in this week’s GopherHole.com Top 25.

Notre Dame will get another chance to show off their defense when they host Michigan on Saturday. Why don’t I have Notre Dame ranked #2? Well, I still feel that Auburn has an excellent team, and just as importantly has a favorable enough scheudle to win every game this year. That schedule includes only 4 road games, and they already took care of one of them with their victory at Mississippi State on Saturday. Auburn will get their first (and maybe biggest) test of the year this Saturday when they host #6 LSU. I still have USC behind Auburn at #3, and they’ll also get a big test this weekend when they host Nebraska. Here is the rest of the this week’s GopherHole.com top 25:

	Team	Record		Last Week
1.	Ohio State	2-0		4
2.	Auburn	2-0		1
3.	Southern Cal	1-0		2
4.	Notre Dame	2-0		7
5.	West Virginia	2-0		5
6.	LSU	2-0		8
7.	Texas	1-1		3
8.	Florida	2-0		12
9.	Florida State	2-0		6
10.	Oklahoma	2-0		10
11.	Tennessee	2-0		9
12.	Miami	1-1		11
13.	Louisville	2-0		16
14.	Georgia	2-0		20
15.	Iowa	2-0		14
16.	Nebraska	2-0		17
17.	Michigan	2-0		19
18.	Virginia Tech	2-0		NR
19.	California	1-1		21
20.	Arizona State	2-0		22
21.	Clemson	1-1		13
22.	Oregon	2-0		23
23.	Texas Tech	2-0		18
24.	Wisconsin	2-0		24
25.	Boston College	2-0		NR

Dropped Out:
15. Penn State (L at Notre Dame, 41-17)
25. TCU (W 46-13, UC-Davis)

Last 5 out
26. TCU
27. Boise State
28. Penn State
29. Georgia Tech
30. Alabama

These rankings are GopherHole.com’s vote in the CollegeRivals.org Top 25 poll. Its voters are staff members from various independent college football websites just like GopherHole.com. Check back each week throughout the season to see the newest poll. Click Here to view the latest CollegeRivals.org Top 25. (This poll will be updated every Tuesday afternoon through out the sesaon.)

Click Here to view last weeks top 25.