Game Preview: Blue Jackets vs. Wild (Game #4)
October 16, 2010While We’re Waiting…ESPN Cheap Shots, Colt Optimism, Cavs Rotations
October 17, 2010
Ohio State goes into Camp Randall stadium tonight as the number one team in the country. It is their first true road test, although the recent play of Illinois puts the game in Champaign into different perspective. It will be a tough night matchup for the Buckeyes but it is a challenge that Jim Tressel and has come to relish, having tremendous success on the road in conference. The bullseye of being number one in the country adds to the challenge.
But win or lose tonight, it’s unlikely they will be number one in the country when put through the nebulous process of ranking teams by the BCS formula. Those rankings will be announced tomorrow night on ESPN. Not only will the Buckeyes be out of the top spot, but they likely will not be ranked 2nd either. Or 3rd. Or probably 4th.
ESPN BCS guru Brad Edwards currently projects that the Buckeyes will be 5th in the BCS ranking released tomorrow night. He projects that Boise State, Oregon, TCU, and Oklahoma will be ranked ahead of the Buckeyes. The rankings are weighted as one third USA Today poll, one third Harris poll, and one third computer rankings. The computer rankings remain the most unsettling aspect of how these rankings shake out after this shady process. At this point, the computers are obviously the aspect of the rankings that knock the Buckeyes all the way down to 5th.
An extremely unsettling article out of Alabama this morning identified some of the problems with the computer rankings aspect of the BCS. The article shed some light on the system of checks on those that produce the sets of computer rankings.
Wes Colley messed up his computer rankings earlier this season.
The man produces one of six sets of computer data for the Bowl Championship Series standings, which debut this season on Sunday night. But he’s just as human as voters who inexplicably ranked Alabama ahead of South Carolina this week.
Colley, a research scientist at the University of Alabama-Huntsville, erred by neglecting to count some new Football Championship Subdivision teams when evaluating Football Bowl Subdivision schedules. CollegeBCS.com’s Jerry Palm caught the mistakes because Colley makes his formula fully public.
“It turns out a professor at Xavier has one of his students reproducing my rankings, so that’s a hoot,” Colley said. “Now it’s not just Jerry Palm checking, but some kid at Xavier.”
Want to know who double-checks the five other computer rankings? Nobody.
The rankings discussion obviously gets many worked up which prompts the “It’s a long season” canned response from the Craig Jameses of the world. It is a preposterous system which is unnecessarily complex and often counter-intuitive. The Buckeyes profile and standing with the computers, however, will continue to improve as the season progresses and their strength of schedule will continue to increase. There is so much that will happen to shake up these rankings between now and the end of the season, and even the end of October.
The drive to the BCS begins, in earnest, tonight in Madison where they face their toughest test of the season to date. Kickoff is at 7 PM on ESPN and leave your comments here as you enjoy the national game of the weekend in college football.
11 Comments
It is hilarious that Boise State and their cupcake schedule will be ranked 1 or 2.
The NCAA’s method of ranking college football is completely and unequivocally flawed.
Boise State played a tougher non-conference schedule than Ohio State, especially because Miami lost to Florida State. While I don’t like Craig James, I feel like the “It’s a long season” response is completely legitimate. Remember in 2007, 6 teams lost ahead of Ohio State in the last two weeks to get us into the Championship Game. The Big Ten is just going to be tougher than the WAC, and other undefeated teams will lose, so everything will fix itself by December.
I’m still willing to accept computer rankings over something a “voter” comes up with.
And when Alabama is willing to travel to Boise State in November to play a game, we’ll worry about BSU’s schedule. You play the games on your schedule.
Someone wake up Ohio State because they are making the experts look like geniuses right now down 21-0 in the second. UGH!
file this under silver lining: http://twitter.com/#!/jimkanicki/statuses/27586301060
this has not been a fluke thus far. D-line getting beaten, pryor not looking capable.
it’s now halftime. if tress pulls this out, it’s time for coach of the year talk.
That was bad. We were owned the first half and part of the 2nd half.
Very poor showing from the #1 team in the nation – for a week at least.
Looks like they choked that one away… pretty standard, really.
OSU was OWNED.. lock, stock and barrel on both lines of scrimmage. That is the big shocker here. Physicality is the calling card of this team and they were dominated by Wisconsin – Physically. This might be a signal moment in the Big Ten. The sun might be setting on OSU.
Great year for Ohio sports.
@9 – I wouldn’t go that far. Tressel is constantly bringing in big name recruits and the fact is there are a handful of schools that are constantly talked about at the top – and OSU is one of those schools. OSU also produces NFL draft picks, which big name recruits also like to see.
As long as Tressel is there, OSU is in great hands (ie, not perfect) and the sun is far from setting in Columbus.