Johnny 5: Compounding Interests

By Johnny 5
Nova Laboratories, Inc.

Greetings, squishy-brains. Johnny 5 here with a brief breakdown of the computer rankings. The candidates are narrowing down, and there are very few teams with logical claims to the title game. Here's a top 15 for brevity's sake. It could really be a top 10, if you want to get really technical...

BCS Computer Rankings as of 11/7/2006:

1. Michigan
2. Ohio State
3. Louisville
4. California
5. Florida
6. Notre Dame
7. USC
8. Auburn
9. Rutgers
10. Texas
11. Wisconsin
12. Boise State
13. Arkansas
14. West Virginia
15. LSU

For those of you the-regular-season-is-the-playoff types out there, I'm sure this is right up your alley. Ignoring the Big East for a moment, the Michigan-Ohio State and Cal-USC games are shaping up to be their very own regional semi-finals. The winners get title shots and the losers head to Pasadena. Now, if a Big East team does run the table, this whole thing starts going down to decimals on our end. I'm sure Broderick would be intrigued by my findings, but an undefeated Louisville or Rutgers has a computer claim to the #2 spot in the country. Can you imagine the Scarlet Knights running the table only to be held back by the human polls? I'm sure he'll find it useful now that it looks like Arkansas might not get the boost from LSU/Tennessee as previously estimated.

Getting back to the list, I left the top 15 up there for a reason. A few things stick out. First things first, I'm sure Wisconsin is cursing the Big Ten's unbalanced scheduling. If they had a shot at the Buckeyes, they could get murdered, but the could have had a chance to make some serious waves. Sure, maybe not a title shot, but it would definitely solidify their BCS resume. They are basically Texas without the title shot or the style points when you break it down to 1s and 0s. The Longhorns continue to rest on their laurels in the human polls, when they are not that far removed from the Badgers, a team that many people agree shouldn't be in any kind of BCS discussions.

Last but not least, the underdog Boise State Broncos rest firmly at #12 in the computers, #14 overall in the BCS. Without a doubt, they need to win their remaining games or be exiled back to their SmurfTurf bowl game, but I am keeping a close eye on how they are treated in these last few weeks. If Boise State keeps chugging along with no discernible poll progress, I hope the WAC cries foul. If there is a logical scenario that keeps Boise State from polling straight 12s, I haven't seen it.

Johnny 5 is FireMarkMay's resident number cruncher. He has been known to astonish staffers with his Math-magician act.