Ohio State remains the top-ranked team in this week’s Coaches and AP polls, but No. 2 Baylor is getting closer to first place in both major rankings. However, the computers now like the Buckeyes enough for the defending champs to take their spot atop the composite below.
College football rankings: Ohio State finally reclaims No. 1 in composite Top 25
Here’s a composite of four big rankings, followed by the individual top 25s.
Week 7 promised some of the best games of this season, and it delivered. None was better than Michigan State's outrageous, last-second triumph over Michigan. That outcome was about as close to impossible as we'll ever see, and Michigan fans didn't take it well. (Le'Veon Bell took it better.).
There was plenty of other wildness. LSU went off the rails and beat Florida on another neatly executed fake field goal. Utah took a safety trying to throw a pass out of its own end zone on a kickoff return but still beat Arizona State. Alabama looked like Alabama in cruisng by Texas A&M. Baylor kept right on being unstoppable, but the Mountaineers’ defensive coordinator had a good sense of humor about it. And a Stanford juggernaut rolled over UCLA in a game that included the best catch of this season.
| Composite ranking | Change | Average ranking | |
| 1 | Ohio State | +9 | 2.25 |
| 2 | Baylor | +5 | 3.75 |
| 3 | Clemson | -2 | 4 |
| 4 | TCU | -2 | 4.75 |
| 5 | Alabama | -1 | 5.75 |
| 6 | LSU | 6.25 | |
| 7 | Utah | -5 | 7.25 |
| 8 | Florida State | -1 | 9.25 |
| 9 | Notre Dame | +3 | 11 |
| 10 | Iowa | +10 | 11.75 |
| 10 | Michigan State | +7 | 11.75 |
| 12 | Michigan | -5 | 12.25 |
| 13 | Stanford | 12.75 | |
| 14 | Florida | -10 | 13.25 |
| 15 | Oklahoma | 13.5 | |
| 16 | Oklahoma State | +3 | 18.75 |
| 17 | Texas A&M | +6 | 19.25 |
| 18 | Toledo | +4 | 19.5 |
| 19 | Ole Miss | -5 | 21 |
| 20 | Duke | +1 | 21.5 |
| 21 | Cal | +4 | 21.75 |
| 22 | Memphis | NR | 23 |
| 23 | Temple | NR | 25.5 |
| 24 | Houston | NR | 26.75 |
| 25 | UCLA | -5 | 27.5 |
| AP | Coaches | S&P+ | Massey | |
| 1 | Ohio State (28) | Ohio State (45) | Clemson | Utah |
| 2 | Baylor (12) | Baylor (12) | Michigan | Ohio State |
| 3 | Utah (16) | TCU (4) | Alabama | Clemson |
| 4 | TCU (3) | Michigan State | Baylor | Alabama |
| 5 | LSU (1) | LSU (1) | Ohio State | LSU |
| 6 | Clemson (1) | Clemson | TCU | TCU |
| 7 | Michigan State | Utah (1) | Florida State | Baylor |
| 8 | Alabama | Alabama | Oklahoma | Iowa |
| 9 | Florida State | Florida State | West Virginia | Florida |
| 10 | Stanford | Notre Dame | LSU | Michigan State |
| 11 | Notre Dame | Stanford | USC | Notre Dame |
| 12 | Iowa | Oklahoma State | Notre Dame | Florida State |
| 13 | Florida | Iowa | Duke | Michigan |
| 14 | Oklahoma State | Florida | Iowa | Oklahoma |
| 15 | Texas A&M (T-15) | Oklahoma | Stanford | Stanford |
| 16 | Michigan (T-15) | Texas A&M | Ole Miss | Oklahoma State |
| 17 | Oklahoma | Memphis (T-17) | Florida | Memphis |
| 18 | Memphis | Michigan (T-17) | Utah | Texas A&M |
| 19 | Toledo | Cal | Toledo | Cal |
| 20 | Cal | Toledo | Wisconsin | Toledo |
| 21 | Houson | Duke | Western Kentucky | Ole Miss |
| 22 | Temple | Houston | Navy | Houston |
| 23 | Duke | Ole Miss | Appalachian State | Mississippi State |
| 24 | Ole Miss | Temple | Illinois | BYU |
| 25 | Pitt | Georgia | UCLA | Temple |
The four rankings used here
The Associated Press Top 25: The longest-running and best-respected human poll. Didn't have any official bearing on the latter years of the BCS, and won't have any official bearing on the Playoff. Expect it to set the course for the committee, however, as most outlets (including SB Nation) will use the AP's rankings as the standard until the committee takes over in November. Usually comes out on Sundays about 2 p.m. ET.
The USA Today Coaches Poll: Formerly part of the BCS, and now just a poll. It tends to be more conservative than the AP's. Though polling athletic departments in order to rank other athletic departments is dubious, we still want multiple human polls in here, and this is the other big one. Releases early Sunday afternoons.
The Massey computer composite: A collection of ... every rating out there, which will be included as soon as it is updated. By including it here, we're giving extra weight to the two human polls, since they're already two of the dozens of ratings included in the Massey. It changes over the course of the week as more rankings arrive.
Bill Connelly's S&P+ ratings: Connelly's efficiency- and explosiveness-based metric parses each team's performance and adjusts it for strength of opposition. These ratings ultimately become part of each FBS team's advanced statistical profile. They're entirely computer-generated and don't signal an agenda against anybody's favorite team.
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SB Nation presents: The wild final play between Michigan and Michigan State
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