Welcome to Wednesday; time to fast for the impending gorgefest on Thursday. Oh, and here's our ballot...
Rocky Top Talk Ballot - Week 13
| Rank | Team | Delta |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Boise St. Broncos |
 2 |
| 2 | Oregon Ducks |
 -1 |
| 3 | TCU Horned Frogs |
-1 |
| 4 | Auburn Tigers | -- |
| 5 | Stanford Cardinal | -- |
| 6 | Wisconsin Badgers | -- |
| 7 | Ohio St. Buckeyes |
1 |
| 8 | LSU Tigers |
2 |
| 9 | Oklahoma St. Cowboys | -- |
| 10 | Michigan St. Spartans |
1 |
| 11 | Nevada Wolf Pack |
3 |
| 12 | Alabama Crimson Tide | -- |
| 13 | Nebraska Cornhuskers |
-6 |
| 14 | Missouri Tigers |
-1 |
| 15 | Oklahoma Sooners |
3 |
| 16 | Arkansas Razorbacks |
1 |
| 17 | Virginia Tech Hokies |
3 |
| 18 | South Carolina Gamecocks |
1 |
| 19 | Arizona Wildcats |
-4 |
| 20 | Texas A&M Aggies |
2 |
| 21 | Florida St. Seminoles | -- |
| 22 | West Virginia Mountaineers |
2 |
| 23 | Northern Illinois Huskies | -- |
| 24 | Utah Utes |
1 |
| 25 | N.C. State Wolfpack | -- |
| Dropouts: Iowa Hawkeyes, Mississippi St. Bulldogs | ||
SB Nation BlogPoll College Football Top 25 Rankings "
The total delta is 57, which is the lowest of the season and fully expected due to the settling of teams into their apparent places in the pecking order. The middle is a whole bunch of blech that could be permuted in a lot of orders, and the Big 12 does the especially kind favor of making beatpaths a difficult tiebreaker. The end also gets a bit muddy, as teams really begin to develop arguments for exclusion in a hurry.
As far as the top is concerned: I don't really see the big deal between being ranked #1 vs. #2 any more, but the question always is whether I think #1 really is the best team. To be honest, Boise State is the one team that matches up the best against Oregon, and I do think they'd be more likely to win that matchup on the strength of a terrific defensive line and an offense that plays as smart as Oregon plays fast. (Seriously, Boise State's D-line is excellent; the one 'weak' spot of the team is the secondary, and none of the other undefeateds are really primed to exploit that.) But this is all judgment and speculation. At the moment, Oregon is the obvious one to be in the NC game, and there's a freely open debate for the other contender.