I am a Florida St. fan, so I know what you are thinking.
Memphis is the greatest G5 team ever and should be #1 without hesitation after going to Doak Campbell and beating FSU.
But has Football Jesus (also known as Lee Corso) says, “Not so fast my friend”.
See, I am a realist. Memphis’s win against an FSU team that has been broken ever since being left out of the 4-team playoff last year doesn’t look all that impressive. They are very good, but that wasn’t the platform to show it. “Beating Navy on the road would be more impressive than beating Florida State in Tallahassee” isn’t a sentence I thought I would be typing in the year of our Lord 2024, but here we are.
So I have looked west to two teams that have looked very good thus far. Boise St. and UNLV. Boise St. still sits at 1-1, but Ashton Jeanty is in the Heisman conversation and it is still September. That isn’t likely to change. And UNLV has two road wins over Big XII foes in Houston and Kansas. Their offense still worries me a bit, but their defense is borderline elite. These two play Oct. 26 in Sin City.
Also making a significant jump is Toledo. This may be recency bias, as I was at the game Saturday in Starkville. The one this that stood out was how the Rockets matched up physically with their SEC foe. And the reality is, you could have switched the jerseys and convinced me the Rockets were Mississippi St. and vice versa. I still love Bowling Green, but they may be looking at 1-2 after their game this week against another SEC foe – Texas A&M. They also play Oct. 26 in Bowling Green.
The rest of the rankings look as follows:
- Boise St. (1-1)
- UNLV (3-0)
- Memphis (3-0)
- Toledo (3-0)
- Texas St. (2-1)
- Liberty (3-0)
- Northern Illinois (2-0)
- Army (2-0)
- Tulane (1-2)
- Coastal Carolina (3-0)
- Bowling Green (1-1)
- South Florida (2-1)
- Navy (2-0)
- Fresno St. (2-1)
- James Madison (2-0)
- Appalachian St. (2-1)
- San Jose St. (3-0)
- Louisiana (2-0)
- UL Monroe (2-0)
- East Carolina (2-1)
- Arkansas St. (2-1)
- Georgia Southern (2-1)
- North Texas (2-1)
- Sam Houston (2-1)
- Eastern Michigan (2-1)
Looking ahead to this week, there is an interesting mix of non-conference opportunities to shock the world (Georgia Southern vs. Ole Miss, Miami vs. Notre Dame, Marshall vs. Ohio St.) as well as chances to humble the ACC even more (James Madison vs. North Carolina, South Florida vs. Miami, Virginia vs. Coastal Carolina). But there are also matchups within the world of the Group of 5 to make notice of (Tulane vs. Louisiana, Toledo vs. Western Kentucky).
Who is overrated? Who is underrated? Who should or should not be on the list? Let us know on our @walkonredshirts socials.
