Group of Five Football Power Rankings, Week 12: ECU, WKU making late-season surge

Group of Five football may be winding down, but there are still a ton of intriguing matchups remaining in the 20201 season

This is a really exciting week for Group of Five football, especially in the American conference. Cincinnati faces their toughest opponent of the season since Notre Dame in SMU.

You better believe the 9-1 Houston Cougars are rooting hard for SMU (8-2) to topple the Bearcats (10-0) to give them their first loss of the season.

Louisiana and Liberty will be squaring off, giving college football fans a game that will surely feature lots of offensive firepower.

Let’s take a look at the Power Rankings as we head into the penultimate week of the 2021 college football season.

The East Carolina Pirates have cracked our Group of Five football Power Rankings for the first time this season after winning three consecutive games in the span of 18 days. Earlier in the season, the Pirates took Houston to overtime and gave them quite a scare. This East Carolina team became bowl-eligible for the first time since 2014 after defeating Memphis in overtime this week.

Western Kentucky also enters our power rankings for the first time this season after an incredible turnaround has made it hard to keep them out of these Group of Five football rankings. This team started the season 1-4 and have since won five consecutive games, making them bowl-eligible for the seventh time in eight seasons. The Hilltoppers are powered by one of the best quarterbacks in  Group of Five football— Bailey Zappe. The 6’1″ Victoria, Texas-native leads the country in passing yards (4,170 yards) and passing touchdowns (42 TDs).

Air Force got back on track after losing two close games in a row: a six-point loss to SDSU and a seven-point loss to rival Army. The Falcons will have a very difficult road test a Nevada this week. If they can unseat the Wolf Pack, they will likely finish the season 9-3. Air Force has only finished a season with three or fewer losses only three times this century (excluding the pandemic season): 2019, 2016, 2014.

The Northern Illinois Huskies continue to fight to stay on top of an ultra-competitive, rollercoaster Mid-American Conference. All six teams in the MAC-West have won five or more games this season. One thing that stands out for the Huskies is that they have taken care of business in conference play, with a current record of 5-1 against MAC opponents. Those late-season Tuesday and Wednesday night MACtion games are a ton of fun to watch.

Army continues its resurgence in the second half of the season after losing tough contests to Ball State, Wisconsin, and Wake Forest. The Black Knights look for another win against UMass before a huge matchup of independents when they take on Liberty in the season’s penultimate game. Army has eight players with 100 or more rushing yards on the season and could realistically end up with 11 by the time the season ends.