Kansas Jayhawks (Photo by Jay Biggerstaff/Getty Images)
Projecting the Week 5 AP Top 25 college football rankings after a wild Saturday with Oklahoma, Texas and Miami all being upset while Ohio State rolled.
It feels like the college football universe is on a see-saw right now. One week, we have a ho-hum Saturday in which everything goes as expected. Then the next week, everyone gets smacked in the face with a heavy dose of chaos. Saturday in Week 4 fell into the latter category.
Whether it was Miami getting their doors blown off by Middle Tennessee, Florida ending its dominance over rival Tennessee, Texas slipping up in overtime against Texas Tech, a field goal hitting the top of the upright to give Texas A&M a win, or Oklahoma getting clipped again by Kansas State, it was just a wild Saturday for teams involved in the college football rankings.
So where does that leave us? Let’s take a look at our projections for the Week 5 AP Top 25 college football rankings.
Projected AP Top 25 college football rankings after Week 4: No. 25-21
25. Syracuse Orange
Syracuse had a projected win total of just 4.0 at some places coming into the season and the Orange have already matched that. It wasn’t the prettiest performance to get by Virginia on Friday night but Dino Babers’ team found a way to get it done behind Garrett Shrader and Sean Tucker in this Robert Anae offense. ‘Cuse might not be a contender to win the ACC at this point but they have put in the work to get a spot in the Top 25.
24. Kansas Jayhawks
Rank the damn Jayhawks. This isn’t just a feel-good story any more. Kansas is 4-0 and has already won more games this season than they have in any single year since 2010 with eight games still remaining. Jalon Daniels and the Rock Chalk offense have been electric and the defense is seemingly improving each week. But with a perfect record and three Power Five wins to their credit, there’s no way the Jayhawks can stay unranked any longer.
23. Florida State Seminoles
Not that there was ever much doubt that Florida State would be able to take care of a Boston College team that has been quite bad this season, but the Seminoles came up with a huge and emphatic win in Week 4 to move to 4-0 in their own right and make a statement. Mike Norvell preached patience and it’s paying off as Jordan Travis looks like a legit star and the defense is playing great football. The Noles might very well be all the way back, or at least close to it.
22. Minnesota Golden Gophers
How many teams does P.J. Fleck need to beat into submission before we start taking notice of Minnesota? Tanner Morgan and Mohamed Ibraheim have been dynamic now that Kirk Ciarrocca is back in control of the offense and now they’ve proved that’s the case in a thorough dismantling of Michigan State. The Golden Gophers look like the favorites to win the Big Ten West and it’s time to start taking them seriously.
21. Pittsburgh Panthers
Truth be told, there’s not a whole lot that we’re ever going to glean from Pitt beating up on a quite outmatched Rhode Island squad on Saturday afternoon. But it is to the credit of Pat Narduzzi’s team, a group that has already seen a number of tough injuries, that Pitt came out and took care of business without much of a real sweat in this game. That’s what good teams do and, while they might have a very defined ceiling, Pitt is never going to be an easy out on a given Saturday.
