Steven M. Sipple: Will NU crack final Top 25?

[HuskerTrucker]

Steven M. Sipple: Will NU crack final Top 25?

 

Tuesday, Jan 06, 2009 - 12:15:29 am CST

 

Two questions to ponder regarding college football polls:

 

1. Does Nebraska deserve a Top 25 ranking?

 

2. Does unbeaten Utah deserve a No. 1 ranking?

 

Some teams contending with Nebraska for spots at bottom of final football Top 25:

 

Let’s begin at the bottom of the ballot.

 

The short answer is yes, Nebraska earned a Top 25 ranking by winning six of its last seven games, including the last four. The 9-4 Huskers’ best arguments are their superb finish, top-15 offense and vastly improved defense.

That said, competition is stiff at the bottom of the ballot. So there’s no guarantee Big Red will crack the final polls. Stay tuned.

 

As an Associated Press voter, I agonize over the final five spots on the ballot because, well, it’s basically a crapshoot. You search for definitive answers that really aren’t there.

 

If I’m reading voters’ minds right — dangerous, I know — Nebraska essentially is in contention for the final few spots with a slew of teams, including Missouri (10-4), Brigham Young (10-3), Oregon State (9-4), Michigan State (9-4), Iowa (9-4), Pittsburgh (9-4), Florida State (9-4), West Virginia (9-4), California (9-4) and Rutgers (8-5).

 

Forget it, Ball State (12-1). Your nonconference schedule was lousy and the MAC is in a down cycle.

 

Bottom line, I tentatively have Nebraska ranked No. 24 on my still-developing final ballot, due right after the BCS national title game. My final five spots likely will go something like this: Michigan State at No. 21, followed by Iowa, Missouri, NU and Florida State.

 

I’m guessing voters will weigh Nebraska’s late-season surge against blowout losses to Missouri (52-17) and Oklahoma (62-28) on national television.

 

As someone who watched the Huskers intently each week, I appreciated the team’s resiliency — the type of factor that tends to elude voters in other regions. Regional vagaries in part define the polls.

 

Nebraska’s defense improved steadily, culminating with an impressive Gator Bowl victory against Clemson in which the Tigers were held to 210 total yards.

 

“I thought we did a good job of hanging in there,” Nebraska athletic director Tom Osborne said Monday. “We persevered well. Our defense did a really good job of holding things down. They couldn’t run the ball on us. Of course, we had bad field position for much of the game, so it made it hard for our defense and offense. But we beat a very good defensive team, and a team that had some good skill players on offense.”

 

Nebraska’s improvement on defense over last season has been in some ways remarkable. To wit: NU finished 112th nationally in total defense in 2007, allowing 476.8 yards per game, but surrendered 349.8 yards this season. That improvement is particularly impressive when you consider Big Red’s personnel on defense in 2007 was on par with or perhaps better than this season’s personnel.

 

My, what good coaching can do ...

 

“(Big 12) offenses stole the show this year and were the focal point of most media attention,” Osborne said. “But it still comes down to this: If you play better defense than your opponents, it gives you a real advantage.”

 

It might even get you in the final Top 25.

 

As for Utah, at least 100 e-mails have poured in from Utes fans imploring me (and other AP voters, I presume) to push Utah to the top spot in the wake of its decisive win against Alabama. I’m not averse to crowning two national champions — an AP champ and BCS titlist.

 

Make no mistake, Utah (13-0) tempts me. But it says here it would be unfair to give the Utes the nod at No. 1 before the BCS title game is played. And to be perfectly honest, Oklahoma and Florida would have to play a mistake-marred game for me to strongly consider pushing Utah to the top.

 

But, hey, the Utes did give pollsters something to ponder — more ammunition for a playoff, if nothing else — as if the bottom of the ballot weren’t challenging enough.

Bottom pushers

 

# Iowa (9-4): Hawkeyes won their final four games, including triumphs against then-No. 3 Penn State and South Carolina in Outback Bowl.

# Florida State (9-4): Seminoles were only 3-3 down the stretch, but came up huge in Citrus Bowl (42-13 against Wisconsin).

# Brigham Young (10-3): Lost its last two games, including a Las Vegas Bowl setback to an 8-5 Arizona outfit.

# Pitt (9-4): Panthers hurt by two bad defeats - a 3-0 loss (yes, 3-0) to Oregon State in Sun Bowl and an inexplicable loss to 6-6 Bowling Green.

# Boston College (9-5): Dropped its last two games, to Virginia Tech and 7-6 Vanderbilt.

# West Virginia (9-4): Early season loss at Colorado haunts Mountaineers.

# California (9-4): Won its last three games, including against Miami in Emerald Bowl.

# Rutgers (8-5): Closed with seven-game winning streak after 1-5 start that included losses to 7-6 Fresno State and 8-5 Navy.

# Ball State (12-1): Hurt by bad loss to Buffalo (42-24) and a weak nonconference schedule (Navy, Indiana, Northeastern, Western Kentucky).

[Ohio Pete]

Shutting down Clemson rushing attack (not that it's great, but they did run on FSU and all over South Carolina) should have impressed the media , but how many AP voters do you think actually saw the game? Between getting ready for whatever game they were covering and watching the Capitol One bowl, I doubt many noticed how good Nebraska's defense looked.

[SkullandBones]

I wonder how many other voters put as much thought into the bottom half of the ballot as Sipple does.

[HuskerTrucker]

I wonder how many other voters put as much thought into the bottom half of the ballot as Sipple does.

So what your saying is...Sipple is a bottom sucker? I think he is just trying to figure out how there is any way that we won't be ranked. I think we have a pretty strong case with what we did the 2nd half of the season. Unfortunately, the way the polls are set up, once your in the Top 25 it is harder to get dropped than it is for a team that isn't ranked the first part of the year to finally get into the Top 25, even if that team is better than the team that was ranked originally. In a way it is the pollsters vindicating themselves for being wrong originally for as long as they can.

 

And that is the whole reason polls suck. IMHO.

[CelticRover20]

Two points: Nebraska deserves to be ranked somewhere between numbers 21 - 25, and the answer to whether or not the BCS should have a playoff receives a resounding YES from me. NU beat a Clemson team that was ranked number 9 when it played Alabama at the beginning of the season. That game alone sent Bama on its way to an eventual number one ranking, which Lou Saban and team held for five weeks. And that came during the crunch time of the season, the final six weeks when everyone is really scrambling to either be in thier conference playoff (not you, Big 10) or for a bowl game assignment. So, Nebraska beating Clemson really is a bigger win than you might think when you examine the victory under a microscope. As for Utah going undefeated and beating Bama in the end? Well, that fact alone proves the the BCS needs some form of playoff system. Utah beat Bama, and the "Tide" ain't no slouch team anymore! How long have SEC fans been screaming that they have the best college football teams in the nation? Forever! Well, dang it, if the football in the SEC, the PAC-10, or even the Big 12 is really that good, then the NCAA and the BCS need to put thier tiny, acorn-sized brains together and figure out a way for the top six, or even top eight teams to meet on successive Saturdays and duke it out. A playoff system to determine the national champion in football is the only way we're ever all going to agree who deserves the national chanpionship and who doesn't. If you think I'm wrong call up Mac Brown at Texas or Pete Carrol at USC and ask them about a playoff system. I bet they'd agree to one now. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

[JTrain]

Do we deserve to be in the Top 25? Who knows? The computers are your best bet at finding an accurate answer, and most of them will stick us between 20 and 28, generally towards the latter if they consider margin of victory (none of the BCS computers are allowed to).

 

Will we be in the Top 25? No. Not unless a whole bunch of pollsters suddenly reevaluate us. We are 33rd at the moment. The majority of the teams directly above us won. We'll jump ahead of ECU and BC. We probably jump #23 Ball St., but Northwestern is uncertain. Even with Northwestern that puts us as 29. You'd have to hope to get by #19 Michigan St., #18 Pitt, #17 BYU, AND #14 Georgia Tech. Those teams all lost, but that's a LONG way for us to jump (or them to drop), and considering we only slipped by unranked Clemson, you have to assume we aren't going to leapfrog that much. I would expect to see us at #28.

 

All that said, pollsters are pretty dumb, and you never know what type of nonsense logic will be used to calculate their votes. So I suppose there is still hope.

[huskered17]

I really don't care if we get ranked this year. I was just hoping to see a turn around, in Bo's first year. I guess myself and much of Husker nation is pleased, with his first year. Starting next season we won't be worried if we will be ranked, as much as where will be ranked.

 

GBR!!!

[AR Husker Fan]

Hope we go unranked - and I hope it eats at every member of the team such that they live in the weight room and come out as man-eating killers next fall.

 

Negatives are stronger motivators than positives, after all...

[topekahusker]

There is going to be more scrutiny on how the pollsters vote this year because of the BcS chaos in the AP. So, they will spend a little more time on it IMHO.

 

If it was basketball season and the 'committee' locked away to determine the 65 teams, they place a great deal of emphasis on how teams finished the season regarding their winning/losing streak.

[HuskerTrucker]

Hope we go unranked - and I hope it eats at every member of the team such that they live in the weight room and come out as man-eating killers next fall.

 

Negatives are stronger motivators than positives, after all...

I do like the way you think...motivation!!!

[zoogs]

Hope we go unranked - and I hope it eats at every member of the team such that they live in the weight room and come out as man-eating killers next fall.

 

Negatives are stronger motivators than positives, after all...

 

You do not know the power of the Dark Side...

[ohiohusker]

Hope we go unranked - and I hope it eats at every member of the team such that they live in the weight room and come out as man-eating killers next fall.

 

Negatives are stronger motivators than positives, after all...

 

 

Uh oh AR...........I agree with you! 100%!

[BIGREDFAN_in_OMAHA]

I also agree with AR that it could be a good motivator. Only days away...

[AR Husker Fan]

Hope we go unranked - and I hope it eats at every member of the team such that they live in the weight room and come out as man-eating killers next fall.

 

Negatives are stronger motivators than positives, after all...

You do not know the power of the Dark Side...

The hell you say - you've never met my first wife.

[AR Husker Fan]

Hope we go unranked - and I hope it eats at every member of the team such that they live in the weight room and come out as man-eating killers next fall.

 

Negatives are stronger motivators than positives, after all...

Uh oh AR...........I agree with you! 100%!

Well, it is hard to argue with perfection.

 

Image of AR Husker Fan buffing his nails on the lapel of his tuxedo, turning, and strolling to his waiting limo...