ESPN Week 4 Ranking: Gophers #7 in B1G

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Gopher07 said:
Other power rankings:

BTN: Gophers #7 http://btn.com/2012/09/16/dienhart-new-team-atop-my-week-4-power-rankings/
Athlon: #11 http://www.athlonsports.com/college-football/big-ten-post-week-3-power-rankings
CBS: #6 http://www.cbssports.com/collegefoo...ankings-ohio-state-claims-top-spot-by-default
Detroit News: #9 http://www.detroitnews.com/article/...s/Detroit-News-Big-Ten-Power-Rankings--Week-4
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Athlon is basing their projections too strongly off of last year's performance. There is absolutely no reason that Penn State, Iowa, Illinois should be ranked higher than us.
 

afurry91 said:
Athlon is basing their projections too strongly off of last year's performance. There is absolutely no reason that Penn State, Iowa, Illinois should be ranked higher than us.
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I think one could make the argument for any of those teams.

Penn State, they lost to a borderline top-25 team in week one and went to the edge against an AQ opponent in week two, losing only because of a terrible kicker. Then they went on to pound a (terrible) FBS school last week.

Illinois had a 20-point victory against Western Michigan at home while Minnesota only managed a 5-point victory. Sure, they got pounded by ASU in the desert, but they also came home and trounced an FCS school last week.

Iowa's loss at home was bad, but it was close to an AQ opponent. They went to a neutral site and beat NIU (better than UNLV), and comfortably won against UNI (better than UNH) last week.

Minnesota needed 3 OTs to beat UNLV, pounded an FCS opponent and escaped against a MAC team at home.

So, while I don't agree with the reasoning, you could make a case that any of those three teams are better than Minnesota based on the schedules each has played (UNLV/UNH/WMU is the worst collection of opponents out of this group of four teams).
 

Delusional Wisconsin fans absolutely shocked that they are ranked so low. Some people apparently think they don't deserve to be there.
 



ESPN comments sections are the internet equivalent of a dumpster fire.
 

I remember the days of the Big 2 and Little 8 and given Ohio State is on probation, it might be the Big 1, Little 10, and Ineligible 1 in 2012.

I don't know where I'd put us. Wisconsin is better than they've played, but they clearly aren't as good as their level of pre-season pub. Something tells me Purdue could surprise. I'm tempted to say Northwestern is winning with mirrors, but I've been saying that for years, so there must be something to them. Michigan State is the class of the (eligible) conference teams, but they got it handed to them the other night by Notre Dame, so who knows how good they are.
 




I like when these weekly power rankings are actually weekly power rankings rather than a predicted order of finish. In that sense, ESPN is usually fun (AR goes out of his way to disclose it is a snapshot), and Athlon and the others are boring.
 

Athlon is a bunch of idiots.. I think AR's ESPN rankings are pretty much spot on, despite our undefeated record.
 

Gopher07 said:
Minnesota needed 3 OTs to beat UNLV, pounded an FCS opponent and escaped against a MAC team at home.
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I don't know that we 'escaped'. The margin wasn't big, and the Gophers didn't play their best, but they led nearly the entire game, much of the game by more than one score. It was a good game, but I think the Gophers clearly deserved to win, especially with a backup QB in.
 




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