Upsets aplenty in college football
Raise your hand if you'd like to be given a top-10 ranking in college football ... but only if you can go more than a week without losing to a team you're supposed to pummel.
The teams that have been given lofty billing behind Florida, Texas and Alabama in the polls keep proving themselves unworthy of it pretty quickly. This week was as heavy in upsets as any I can remember. The Nos. 4, 5 and 6 teams, along with the No. 9 team, in the AP Poll all were defeated. Because nobody can win when they've been voted into those spots, four one-loss teams already occupy top-10 spots in the latest AP poll, which was released today.
Naturally, a Big Ten Conference team was as big a disappointment as anyone this weekend. With the country watching on Saturday Night Football, fifth-ranked Penn State lost 21-10 at home to previosly unrated Iowa. While the win was a huge one for the Hawkeyes, who might be better than anyone wanted to give them credit for, it probably erases the already slim chance that a Big Ten team might play for the national title in early 2010.
But the Nittany Lions weren't even the highest-rated team to lose to an unranked opponent this week. That dubious distinction goes to Ole Miss, which was No. 4 prior to its 16-10 loss Thursday night to South Carolina. The most embarrasing loss by a top-10 team doesn't belong to either Penn State or Mississippi, however. Sixth-ranked California easily takes the cake there, as it fell 42-3 to yet another team that started the week outside of the top-25, Oregon.
The weekend's most impressive Big Ten team? I suppose that would be Ohio State, which defeated Illinois 30-0, though that's as much because the Fighting Illini are awful as it is because the Buckeyes were outstanding. Michigan, which seemed to be on its way up, had all kinds of trouble holding off lowly Indiana.
Another bad Big Ten team, Purdue, could've been the Cinderella of the conference had it beaten Notre Dame. Instead, an awful, awful, awful timeout called by the Boilermakers late when they were on defense helped Jimmy Clauson have time to throw the winning touchdown pass to Kyle Rudolph with just under 0:25 to play.
