College Football: Group of Five Week 6 power rankings

Every Group of Five conference still has a shot to land a team in a New Year’s Six bowl. Here is the pecking order among mid-majors entering Week 6 play.

The 2017 college football season nears its midway point as the calendar flips to October. As autumn arrives in full bloom, the battle to earn the automatic Group of Five bid into a New Year’s Six bowl is heating up around the country. Conference races are in full swing, while several teams continue to make statements against Power Five opponents.

At this point, every one of the Group of Five conferences has at least one contender in the New Year’s Six competition. The College Football Playoff selection committee still has several weeks before it releases its first rankings of the season. But three mid-major programs are ranked in the AP Top 25, and three more are among the others receiving votes.

Who might be among their favorites to land an invitation to one of the premier bowl destinations? We have seen Mountain West, American Athletic Conference, and MAC teams land the lucrative bid in the first three years of the new system. Could a Conference USA or Sun Belt team join that list in 2017?

Only five undefeated teams remain among the Group of Five leagues, and eight more are sitting on a single loss at this point of the year. Just as we do every week, let’s dive in to assess the pecking order among the mid-major contenders in this week’s Group of Five Power Rankings.