AP drops BYU from 15 to 18
 

Week 2 rankings

East Carolina jumps from 27 to 14, taking the BCS lead.

Utah holds at 22.

UCLA falls from 23 to 26 with a bye.

I'm trying to remind myself that it doesn't matter.

This week, seemingly every top 25 team obliterated its competition. BYU didn't look that great against a weak PAC-10 team. And frankly, unless BYU improves, it will lose a game. No way you go undefeated when you leave receivers THAT open during the last game-determining drive. So all things said, the fact that they dropped probably doesn't matter.

But it still bugs me that we dropped after WINNING a game.

It wasn't just a bad performance against a bad team. Heck, BYU jumped from 16 to 14 after beating a 6-7 UCLA in the Vegas Bowl on a blocked kick. The controversy clearly has played a part in the drop, and given the astonishingly large number of people who apparently sincerely believe that Locker just tossed the ball over his shoulder, that bugs me just a bit.

But like I said, probably won't matter in the long run.

I think it's kind of funny that tOSU dropped two and they haven't even lost to USC yet.

Bucks by 3 Saturday. It's going to be a bad day for So Cal college football fans.

Nope. The Trojans only lose to teams like Stanford at home. They won't drop the ball on a big one like this.

Plus, did you see tOSU yesterday? It wasn't pretty.

Bollocks!

Yeah, that was classic Tressle ball yesterday. Win ugly. That's what they're going to do Saturday. Throw in the beating UCLA is going to take next Sunday will be sad place for So Cal college football fans.

Hey, I gotta admit I like the way you think. But with USC having an off-week to prepare, tOSU looking sloppy and having to play *at* USC, and the Pac-10 refs heading into the UCLA game getting so much publicity for "robbing" one of their own, I remain skeptical on both counts.

I do too. There won't be PAC-10 refs for the UCLA game though. Both USC and UCLA are coming off a bye. That has me more than a little concerned. OSU often looks very average before a big game so I'm not as concerned with that as I am about USC's overall great talent.

Early in the season, I'd rather have two games of experience than one game and a bye week. Experience>>>rest (plus an extra week of game prep) in the third week of the season.

Also, I fully expect BYU to pull out some stellar trick plays for this next game.

You are correct. I was mistaken. In that case I'd give the Cougars the definite advantage. The Cougars, in addition to being the stronger team and playing at home, will hear all the talk and have want to "prove" that yesterday's win was not a fluke.

The drop was deserved.

You win 35 to 21, then you don't drop. Barely put out a win with a controversial call to help you against a sorry BCS team definitely going to finish in the bottom half of the conference? Voters not impressed.

USC barely beat UW last year, and they didn't drop at all. BYU dropped because: 1) they are not a BCS team; and 2) ESPN made such a big deal out of the call at the end that people have the feeling BYU should have lost the game.

In reality, BYU was dominating offensively. Does anyone here think that even if the game went into OT that UW could have stopped BYU's offense from the 25? Even on the last drive of the game, UW had 3rd and long several times and one 4th down conversion. They moved the ball, but hardly at will like BYU did (see also BYU's 96 yard drive as another example which would have ended the game but for a very unfortunate fumble).

You asked this question earlier and I will reply with the same:

-BYU had 10 drives and scored on 4 of them.
-Washington had 9 drives and scored on 4 of them.

I disagree with your use of the word "dominating."

Even if BYU has a very good offense (which they do), they also have a very mediocre defense.

And that's why an undefeated season would be so remarkable, even with this relatively easy schedule.

BYU won't go undefeated -- in fact they'll lose at least three or four games --unless their backfield shows an ability to cover anybody in better shape than an obese and senile bingo player.

BYU shot themselves in the foot a handful of times, but they were steamrolling UW on offense in the 4th quarter, and there is no reason to believe anything was going to change.

Total yards:

BYU: 475
UW: 337

Rushing Yards:

BYU: 137 (4.9 ypc average)
UW: 133 (3.8 ypc average)

Passing yards:

BYU: 338 (8.2 ypc average)
UW: 204 (6.4 ypc average)

3rd down conversions:

BYU: 12 of 14 (86%)
UW: 9 of 15 (60%)

Where BYU got hurt was in penalties (7 for 60 yards, versus 4 for 25 for UW) and turnovers (2, including the fumble at the goal line which would have ended the game).

Disagree all you want, but BYU's offense dominated.

agreed

if Locker was even sort of accurate we lose that game in a bad way. Good thing for us he is a better running back than a quarterback.

Go take a valium. Your comparison is silly, and obnoxious. USC was rolling over good teams last year one after another all last year and year after year for two yeas before that. If you're the team to beat, it's not unusual in a big, tough conference to have a close game against a team you should dominate, especially an old rival. BYU has't the record to buffer a down game against Washington. Besides, as bad as Washington was last year it's worse this year.

How many examples do you want? You want one from Week 2 last year with a highly ranked team playing a very close game against a much worse team?

Cal beat CSU in Week 2 last year, 34-26. Cal went from 10th to 8th in the AP.

Nebraska beat Wake Forest 20-17. Nebraska went from 16th to 14th in the AP (Wake wasn't receiving any votes at the time the game was played, having lost to BC by 10 the week before).

Your bucks won't be able to score enough to keep up. They are going to lose and lose big.

Do they just hate BYU? Clearly BYU doesn't have the history to convince them that BYU had a bad game, rather than the teams were closely matched.

oh, give it a rest.

Everybody knows some teams get the benefit of the doubt and others don't. Depends on the logo on the jersey. That's all Cali's trying to say.

Listen to the batgirl SU. You might learn something.

Why do some teams get the benefit of the doubt?

Honestly, I think BYU is overrated because they have had a relatively easy schedule the past three years. Their coach admitted he's softening up the schedule to make it easier to get into the BCS.

And Washington is your example? Bronco has had almost no impact on the schedule for this year. He wouldn't have had any impact, except Nevada cancelled, and BYU got Northern Iowa instead (who is probably better than Nevada).

Do you really think some teams don't get the benefit of the doubt more than others? Do you honestly think this is just a matter of the voters not knowing how good BYU is because it is just week 2 and they don't have a lot of info on which to base their opinion yet? Then how do you respond to Nebraska moving up (how did that season end, by the way) or Cal from last year in week 2? The voters didn't have any more information on those two teams than they have on BYU.

There is a BCS bias, and it is strong. Voters tend to punish non-BCS schools more than their BCS counterparts. The UW game is a good example (as is UW v USC last year where USC moved up after a narrow win against UW, who was worse last year than they will be this year).

I think the BCS bias is not irrational, it's based on common sense. You won't see me whining because the polls don't treat Utah with the same deference as USC or Florida or Ohio State. If Florida narrowly escapes upset by a crappy team it's not the same as if Utah or BYU does. Your argument that BYU deserves the same deference as USC is funny as a crutch. You're just defeating your own argument by using USC-Washington as your example. You're parochial, narrow minded, and biased, like most BYU fans.

I'll agree with you that USC deserves more of a "benefit of the doubt" than BYU, but I won't agree that BYU fans are any more "parochial, narrow-minded, and biased" than Utah (or any other non-BCS team) fans. In fact, I would probably use those terms to describe that statement.

You may be right. Utah fans also tend to be that way. I'm less parochial, biased and narrow minded than most BYU or Utah fans. I can't believe anyone would complain an MWC team gets less benefit of the doubt than USC. Cali's posts here are classics, though.

If you disagree with the USC example, fine, disagree. At least attempt to address Cal and Nebraska from last year as examples too.

You're just angry because you are voting for someone who doesn't believe in evolution. Don't vent your anger here.

Intellectual dishonesty can be very taxing.

That's a bit of an extreme example, though, because you're not comparing to an average or prototypical BCS team. You're comparing to the premier team of the decade. USC is given more benefit of the doubt than any team in the nation, BYU included. The Trojans didn't even play this week and they picked up something like a dozen #1 votes.

Seattle's being a dork, but at the same time you're overstating things to suggest, "Oh! They dropped us! They must hate non-BCS schools!" It's not exactly a BCS/nonBCS thing. For example, if Kansas makes it up to the top five and then drops a game, they're going to be punished in the polls a lot more than Oklahoma or Texas would for dropping the same game. Not only are Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas all BCS schools, but they're all in the same conference.

So it's not a BCS-nonBCS thing. It's just a preconception thing about which schools "should" be ranked where.

That's why I usually opt for plain old run of the mill dishonesty. It simplifies things.

USC actually fell from 1 to 2 last year when they barely beat Washington.

You really cant argue the drop, Oregon has to jump BYU just based on common opponents, East Carolina also jumps BYU based on beating 2 top 20 teams in consecutive weeks.

Bingo. Oregon destroyed WA, even though it was at home.

BYU squeaked by WA.

That makes sense. I'm going to "think Bronco" and not sweat this too much. The answer is to go and perform better this week.

Let me add that we were tied with ASU and they beat Stanford 41-17 so I can see them jumping us as well. Thats 3 spots all justified.

As Bill Clinton said, "I Love you. I love you, I love you, I love you...."