The underdog continues his romp through the college football season with USC stepping up as the latest high profile victim…More on the developing season in the entry below.

OSU Opponent Watch

• Youngstown State (4-2) – Played Southern Illinois on the road, lost 17-24. Conclusion: Unexpected Loss
• Akron (3-3) – Played Western Michigan on the road, won 39-38. Conclusion: Unexpected Win
• Washington (2-3) – Bye week.
• Northwestern (3-3) – Played Michigan State on the road, won 48-41 in OT. Conclusion: Unexpected Win
• Minnesota (1-5) – Played Indiana on the road, lost 20-40. Conclusion: Expected Loss
• Purdue (5-1) – Played Ohio State at home, lost 7-23. Conclusion: Expected Loss
• Kent State (3-3) – Played Miami (Ohio) at home, lost 13-20. Conclusion: Unexpected Loss
• Michigan State (4-2) – Played Northwestern at home, lost 41-48 in OT. Conclusion: Devestating Loss
• Penn State (4-2) – Played Iowa at home, won 27-7. Conclusion: Expected Win
• Wisconsin (5-1) – Played Illinois on the road, lost 26-31. Conclusion: Tough Loss.
• Illinois (5-1) – Played Wisconsin at home, won 31-26. Conclusion: Quality Win
• Michigan (3-2) – Played Eastern Michigan at home, won 33-22. Conclusion: Tougher than Expected Win

Buckeye opponent’s records after the sixth week, 42-28. After 3 weeks of conference play, Ohio State, Illinois, and Michigan have no losses and are in contention for the Big 10 championship. Penn State rebounded with a win over sagging Iowa, Indiana continues to surprise blasting Minnesota. Michigan struggled again with an athletic quarterback running the spread (surprise, surprise.) And Illinois is playing hard-nosed football again knocking Wisconsin from the ranks of the unbeaten. With Missouri’s play (the lone Illini loss) – this team looks tough and for real. I’m not completely sold on them yet, but the talent level is certainly higher and they’re playing well together.

Quick Hits from Around College Football

Teams that look like mythical national championship (MNC) contenders from week 5: LSU, Ohio State,and California.

These are the undefeated survivors; their play to-date and/or competition level leaves room for doubt:
Arizona State, Boston College, Cincinnati, Kansas, Missouri, Connecticut, South Florida, and Hawaii .

These teams are the “Top 10” of the 1 loss club:
Oklahoma, USC, Illinois, Oregon, South Carolina, West Virginia, Kentucky, Wisconsin, Virginia, and Indiana

Game of the week? It’s a no-brainer. Stanford 24, USC 23 in Southern California…This arguably, is as bad, if not worse than the Michigan meltdown against App State in week one. Runner up: Notre Dame 20, UCLA 6. The Bruins ruined Charlie’s perfect season – I’m happy the streak didn’t end against a Big 10 team. So much for the Pac 10 being the strongest conference…

Mismatch of the week, Division III Wittenberg whipped Earlham on the road, 73-0. Not a good week for Indiana teams playing Ohio teams…

My Special Top 12 rankings: (Why Top 12? That’s where you need to be to get into BCS contention.) Once again, due to underdogs biting, the rankings get a shakeup. Last week, I gave undefeated teams the benefit of the doubt. This week, there is a tiering, undefeated teams playing well are tier 1, once defeated teams rebounding are tier 2, undefeated teams not likely to stay perfect are tier 3, and once defeated teams that haven’t rebounded are tier 4.

1. LSU – On the ropes for 3 quarters, they pulled it out when it mattered. They don’t look as unbeatable these days.
2. California – Sometimes a bye week is all that is required…
3. Ohio State – A quality road win, the offense regressed this week.
4. Missouri – May actually be in position to win the Big 12 after blasting Nebraska, who’d a thunk it?
5. Boston College – Mushed the MAC this week, rolling along a little under the radar.
6. Oklahoma – Redeemed at the Red River.
7. Oregon – Bye week.
8. Illinois – Quality win over Wisconsin (who had been asking for it all season).
9. Cincinnati – Quality road win over Rutgers.
10. South Florida – Struggled in win over 3-3 Florida Atlantic – Kentucky beat them by 28 a week ago…
11. Arizona State – Struggled against a bad Washington State team.
12. USC – Probably shouldn’t be here, but too talented to completely abandon. They’ve had their stinker game, look for them to win out and then moan about being left out of the MNC game.

My Special Bottom 5 rankings: (Why bottom 5? If you finish there you should be relegated to I-AA) – This week, we’ve had a shakeup at the bottom of the standings too with Notre Dame and Rice, gasp, winning!

1. UCLA – They’re an honorary #1 for getting blown out by Utah and then breaking Notre Dame’s perfect winless season yesterday.
2. Florida International – 0-6 this season.
3. Utah State – 0-5 this season.
4. Colorado State – 0-5 this season.
5. Marshall – 0-5 this season.

In the coming week I’ll post an Kent State/OSU preview, a game review of Kent State/OSU, and a Weekend Update Sports edition.