Congrove's Personal Rankings, And a Few Thoughts On What We've Learned

November 1, 2020 by Staff

Alabama moves into the top spot of Congrove's personal top ten after week 9 of the college football season, and Cincinnati cracks his Top Ten.

Dave Congrove's proprietary algorithm forms the basis of the Congrove Computer Rankings on CollegeFootballPoll.com, but he also has his own idea of how the teams should be ranked.

He typically gets to share his opinion as a regular voter in the FWAA Super 16 Poll, but that poll is currently on hiatus. Thus, here is Congrove's personal top ten.

Note: The list below is in order of Congrove's own rankings, with the ranking of his computer formula in parenthesis.

1) Alabama (1)

2) Clemson (2)

3) Ohio State (4)

4) Georgia (3)

5) Notre Dame (5)

6) USC (8)

7) Texas A&M (13)

8) Florida (12)

9) Cincinnati (18)

10) Oklahoma State (19)

Congrove's Thoughts On....

... ranking the teams:

"Right now, it isn't easy to even tell who's Number 1.  I felt like Clemson had to take a drop with the close call against B.C., but an argument can be made that Clemson is sooo good, they can still rally without him. But keep in mind that BC was only 4-2 before the game and was destroyed 40-14 by Virginia Tech, and the Hokies didn't have Trevor Lawrence either."

.... Why 'Bama at No. 1:

The 41-0 win over Mississippi State on Saturday let us see a complete game from the Tide.They are a dominant force."

.... Ohio State at #3:

"The Buckeyes were good at Penn State, with moments of brilliance, but the 25 points surrendered should give Ohio State fans pause for concern. Still, I rank the Buckeyes just ahead of Georgia and Notre Dame, but all 3 are interchangeable to me right now."

... Oklahoma State at #10

"I had them at 6 before the loss, so 10 is a decent drop. My argument at 10 had several teams in the mix, including Indiana and BYU."

... Cincinnati:

"Luke Fickell has transformed the program into one which could be competitive in any Power 5 league. In the last two weeks, the Bearcats crushed a then-unbeaten SMU 42-13, and a really good Memphis squad 49-10."

... Where is Wisconsin?

"The Badgers were 46-7 winners over Illinois in week 1, but couldn't play last week's scheduled game against Nebraska due to Covid, and have had to also cancel this week's date with Purdue. I may keep the Badgers on the sideline until they get back on the field because 1-0 isn't going to get them anywhere. The conference has stipulated that a team must play at least six games of its eight planned games to be eligible for the Big Ten Championship Game, unless the average number of regular-season games played by all conference teams falls below six. If the average falls below six, the minimum would then become two fewer games than the average (i.e. a minimum of four games if all Big Ten teams play an average of six games)."