Here’s my ballot for this week’s CBS Sports College Football BlogPoll hosted by—as you might imagine—CBS Sports.

Week 8

Through 18 October 2008

Well, apparently no one wants to be in the bottom half of my ballot, because almost all of the teams below No. 13 on my ballot from last week lost.  With one more weekend of the college football season behind us, there are a great many changes in my BlogPoll ballot for this week.  Most of these should be fairly obvious.  Either way, here’s my ballot:

My Ballot for the Week

Rank	Team	Delta
1	Texas	1
2	Alabama	1
3	Penn State	–
4	Oklahoma	–
5	Southern Cal	–
6	Texas Tech	–
7	Georgia	–
8	Florida	–
9	Ohio State	1
10	LSU	1
11	Utah	1
12	Oklahoma State	1
13	Boise State	3
14	TCU	12
15	Missouri	6
16	South Florida	10
17	Ball State	6
18	Pittsburgh	8
19	Boston College	7
20	Minnesota	4
	Georgia Tech	5
22	Kansas	8
23	Brigham Young	8
24	Oregon	1
25	Wake Forest	8

Dropped Out: North Carolina (#18), California (#19), Vanderbilt (#20), Michigan State (#21), Virginia Tech (#22).

Explanations after the jump…

Comments, Explanations, and Excuses

Here are the high-points of the week’s changes:

Texas (1) & Alabama (2):

After beating the Oklahoma Sooners (4) two weeks ago, the Texas Longhorns turned around and gave the Missouri Tigers (15) a gut punch this week.  Texas has asserted itself as a force to be reckoned with, and one which is deserving of the No. 1 ranking.  Meanwhile, the Alabama Crimson Tide (2) followed their typical MO by jumping out to a big lead early in the game, and then falling asleep in the second-half.  While they came away with a nice win against the Ole Miss Rebels (NR), frankly I expected more from them.  Thus, Texas gets the nod this week.

The good news for the Tide is that, as a team, Alabama is very young and thus looks to be a potential juggernaut next season.  Of course, I do have them ranked No. 2, which isn’t exactly bad.

TCU (14) & South Florida (16):

The TCU Horned Frogs and South Florida Bulls both made massive jumps in my ballot this week—coming from the hinterland to No. 14 and 16 respectively.  This is due to a few things.  One, the whole back end of my ballot from last week emptied out like water from a jug.  Two, I probably—due to my ineptitude—probably had these teams underrated.  I had anticipated both of these teams returning to my Top 25, but did not see them making such meteoric jumps.  The fact of the matter is, however, when putting my ballot together this week I concluded one thing: they earned it.

Returners & First Timers:

There are a lot of new faces this week.  In addition to TCU and South Florida, I have three other first-timers in this week’s poll ballot.

The Pittsburgh Panthers (18) have been quietly putting a very solid season together.  Admittedly, they play in the Big East, and—aside from their victory over South Florida (16)—have not really faced a whole lot of tough competition, but since their opening loss to Bowling Green (NR), they have looked solid and taken care of business.

The Boston College Eagles (19) got a nice win against the Virginia Tech Hokies (NR) this weekend, and improved to 5-1 on the season.  Unfortunately for BC, however, they have North Carolina (NR), Notre Dame (NR), Florida State (NR), Wake Forest (NR), and Maryland (NR) coming up in the second-half of their season.  Though unranked, any (or all) of these games could be a loss.

The Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets (21) are now 6-1, and they have some quality wins.  They also win the award for the ugliest and least impressive win of the year in their 10-7 win over Gardner-Webb a week ago.  Be that as it may, the Yellow Jackets managed to stomp on the hearts of an already demoralized Clemson Tigers (NR) squad this week.  I suppose that counts for something, thus they debut at lucky number 21 in my ballot this week.

“Now Departing at Gate 21…”:

Though, on a personal level, I hated to boot the Vanderbilt Commodores (NR) from my ballot, it appears that their lack of offensive production is catching up with them.  Still, they were in their game against the Georgia Bulldogs (7) till the end.  Sorry to see you go Vandy, it was fun while it lasted…

Other departures included the North Carolina Tarheels (NR) who should be back if they can beat Boston College next week.

The California Golden Bears (NR) lost to a tough Arizona squad, and will have an uphill battle to re-join the Top 25 considering the remainder of their schedule includes Southern Cal (NR).  I really thought that the Michigan State Spartans (NR) would give the Ohio State Buckeyes (9) a tough game this past weekend in East Lansing.  Needless to say, 45-7 was not what I had in mind.

Lastly, the Virginia Tech Hokies (NR) lost to Boston College this weekend and picked up their second loss of the season.  Now they get to look forward to a schedule including Florida State (NR), Miami (NR), Maryland (NR), and rival Virginia (NR).  I see them losing at least one, maybe two, of these games, and I’ll be surprised if they manage to make it back.

The Rest of the BlogPoll

Having taken the time to consider my feeble attempt at ranking the powers in college football, feel free to try and convince me that I am wrong — which is part of the way the BlogPoll is supposed to work.  I promise that I will consider all comments.

As for the rest of the BlogPoll, well, you can check out how other bloggers voted and how your team fared across the blogosphere over at MGOBlog, and view the BlogPoll Top 25 results each week over at CBS Sports.

And that’s the way it is…

– Go Figure …

About the Author:  "Lawvol" -- I'm just a guy living in North Carolina who has an unnatural fascination with the color orange. Just because I'm a Tennessee alum and die-hard Volunteer fan doesn't mean that I can't poke a little fun at the Big Orange and anybody else for that matter. Feel free to complain all you want. >> Read more from this author

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