USC’s win over Ohio State has the AP Top 25 in line for a shakeup, and the Trojans are right at the center of it.
After getting blasted 24-7 at Wisconsin and dropping out of the poll from No. 16, USC answered with its biggest statement of the season: a 30-18 win over the No.
2 Buckeyes in Los Angeles on Halloween. Lincoln Riley’s team led for 59 minutes, and after a week in which Riley was asked to explain why he’s the right fit in Southern California, he got the kind of result that changes the conversation fast.
The question now is how high USC climbs after going from unranked to beating one of the nation’s top teams. The Trojans are back in the College Football Playoff picture and back in the Big Ten Championship race with two losses, but the AP voters have to decide how much weight to give that win and how far to push Ohio State down in response.
That part matters because the Buckeyes didn’t look like the No. 2 team in the country for much of the night. With freshman quarterback Luke Fahey starting, Ohio State had trouble finishing drives and settled for field goals instead of touchdowns. The loss to an unranked USC team could send the Buckeyes tumbling well beyond the usual one- or two-spot slide, and there’s even a chance they fall out of the top 10 entirely.
The rest of Saturday only adds to the chaos. While most of the top 10 handled business, No.
5 Notre Dame, No. 6 Utah and No.
7 UCLA all stand to move up. Miami, meanwhile, barely survived on the road, edging North Carolina 38-35 after a scare that nearly turned into a disaster.
There were other close calls and a few clean finishes across the rankings. Minnesota pushed No.
4 Indiana to overtime after a 60-yard field goal forced the extra period, but the Hoosiers pulled out a 23-16 win. In the ranked-on-ranked games, No.
13 Texas Tech beat No. 22 Arizona, and No.
3 Georgia rolled past No. 17 Florida.
That’s part of why the back end of the poll looks especially unstable. No.
20 Northwestern lost to Oregon, No. 19 SMU fell to Syracuse, No.
25 Wisconsin was beaten 30-0 by Iowa, and No. 24 Oklahoma State lost to Iowa State on a walk-off field goal.
Iowa’s result is especially notable after the Badgers had just held USC to seven points the week before.
The projected reshuffle reflects all of that movement. One version has Miami at No. 1, followed by Georgia, Indiana, Notre Dame, Utah, UCLA, BYU, Kentucky, Alabama and Texas. In that projection, Ohio State drops to No. 11, with Ole Miss, Texas Tech, USC, Wake Forest, LSU, Tennessee, Houston, Boise State, Missouri, Iowa, Florida, Oregon, New Mexico and Arizona filling out the rest.
Another projection keeps Ohio State at No. 2 behind Miami, with Georgia third and Indiana fourth. That version has Notre Dame at No.
5, Utah at No. 6, UCLA at No. 7 and BYU at No. 8, while USC lands at No.
- It also places Florida at No.
17, SMU at No. 19, Northwestern at No.
20, Arizona at No. 22, Missouri at No.
23, Oklahoma State at No. 24 and Wisconsin at No. 25.
USC looks like the most likely team to jump back in after beating the No. 2 team in the country at home, but the Trojans still have work ahead with No. 4 Indiana and No.
7 UCLA remaining on the schedule. Oregon also has a shot to keep climbing, with a chance to upset Ohio State in week 10, while Iowa gets Northwestern next.
One more question hanging over the poll: will voters punish teams for surviving instead of dominating? BYU beat Arizona State by one score, and Indiana needed overtime against Minnesota, while Notre Dame and Utah looked sharper against weaker opponents. However the AP voters sort it out, the bottom half of the rankings looks set for major turnover.
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