Seven different AP Top 25 teams lost on Saturday, including two in ranked matchups. Who came out the biggest winners and losers in this week’s poll?
The weekly release of the AP Poll is always an event, at least for the first few months of the season before the College Football Playoff selection committee’s Top 25 takes precedence in the national consciousness.
A big reason for that is the fact that so much churn happens among the various contenders and pretenders for conference and national accolades over the first month of the season. September, with a glut of non-conference games, helps begin to formulate perceptions about the relative strength and weakness of each conference that become entrenched for the rest of the season.
Days like the one that transpired on Saturday are exactly why college football is so fun. Anywhere from three to five teams were in a position to fall completely out of the poll after losing, and it was anyone’s guess as to who would be in the Top 25 this week and where they would all land.
In the end, five new teams climbed made it into this week’s AP Poll after earning statement wins on Saturday. That meant five teams dropped out as well. Virginia Tech, Oklahoma State, TCU, Texas A&M, and Boston College were the five victims of the weekend of chaos. But were they the biggest losers of the bunch? Keep reading to see which teams were the biggest winners and the biggest losers in the shuffle of this week’s AP Top 25 poll.