Super 16 Poll Week 6: Complete Rankings Released for 2014 Season
Finding an order for the nation's 16 best college football teams is never easy. For the 2014 season, though, it appears the teams are looking to make it especially difficult.
While every team ranked inside the Top 10 a week ago was either idle or came away with a win, Week 5 action once again muddied the national championship picture. Florida State again had to overcome its own shortcomings, Texas A&M found itself scrambling to avoid an upset and UCLA arguably staked its claim in the national championship race with an emphatic win at Arizona State.
The result? Well, mostly inertia. But with a few small changes. The Seminoles' near miss drops them out of the No. 1 spot in favor of idle Oregon, while the rising Bruins barged their way into the Top 10. Here is a look at how the rest of the Super 16 played out, along with Bleacher Report's latest Top 25:
.jpg?w=256 "Ohio State Team Doctor")
| 1 | Oregon (11) | 600 | 2 | Oregon |
| 2 | Florida State (18) | 595 | 1 | Alabama |
| 3 | Alabama (6) | 583 | 3 | Oklahoma |
| 4 | Oklahoma (5) | 562 | 4 | Florida State |
| 5 | Auburn (1) | 485 | 6 | Auburn |
| 6 | Texas A&M | 452 | 5 | Baylor |
| 7 | Baylor | 400 | 7 | Texas A&M |
| 8 | UCLA | 322 | 11 | Michigan State |
| 9 | Notre Dame | 321 | 8 | Notre Dame |
| 10 | Ole Miss | 270 | 9 | UCLA |
| 11 | Michigan State | 267 | 10 | Mississippi State |
| 12 | Mississippi State | 225 | 12 | Ole Miss |
| 13 | Georgia | 153 | 13 | Georgia |
| 14 | Stanford | 88 | NR | Stanford |
| 15 | LSU | 65 | NR | USC |
| 16 | BYU | 62 | 16 | LSU |
| 17 | N/A | BYU | ||
| 18 | N/A | Wisconsin | ||
| 19 | N/A | Nebraska | ||
| 20 | N/A | East Carolina | ||
| 21 | N/A | Ohio State | ||
| 22 | N/A | Oklahoma State | ||
| 23 | N/A | Kansas State | ||
| 24 | N/A | Clemson | ||
| 25 | N/A | Arizona State |
With quarterback Jameis Winston back in the lineup after serving a one-game suspension, Florida State earned a 56-41 win over North Carolina State. Sounds simple enough. Surely the Wolfpack had a couple garbage-time touchdowns to turn a blowout into an unrepresentative final score, right?
Not exactly.
Before an upset-minded crowd in Raleigh, NC State came out and opened the game with a 24-7 first-quarter run and held the lead for the majority of the game. Shadrach Thornton's 10-yard touchdown in the third quarter gave the Wolfpack a 38-28 lead with just more than 21 minutes remaining, seemingly paving the way for the biggest upset of the season.
It wasn't to be. Winston gave Florida State its first lead of the game with two third-quarter touchdowns and Karlos Williams capped off a 28-3 run to close out the game with two scores in the fourth. The Seminoles offense turned the ball over four times, including two interceptions from Winston. The Heisman-winning quarterback already has two multi-interception games, as many as he had during his record-setting freshman campaign.
"When's the last time the offense and defense actually clicked on the same note?" Winston told reporters. "I don't know. We've got so much potential. We've got so much to look for. I'm telling you, that's the most exciting part."
After not having a team come closer than two touchdowns in 2013, Florida State has already had two teams come within one score this season. Jimbo Fisher's team has two relative byes against Wake Forest and Syracuse coming up before a marquee battle with Notre Dame.
Texas A&M has no such luck. The Aggies will have to write the postmortem on their overtime win against Arkansas and ready themselves for possibly the toughest three-week stretch on anyone's schedule starting Saturday at Mississippi State.
Kenny Hill led his team back from a 28-14 second-half deficit to score the game's final 21 points. He hit Edward Pope on an 86-yard pitch and catch to start the fourth quarter and found Josh Reynolds from 59 yards out with just over two minutes remaining to force overtime. In the extra fame, the Heisman contender needed one play to hit Malcome Kennedy from 25 yards out.
The Aggies defense, which gave up 285 yards and three touchdowns on the ground, held Alex Collins to no gain on a 4th-and-1 try at the 16-yard line to close it out.
"In order to win a game like that, it takes a complete team. Every phase had its poor moments in the first half," coach Kevin Sumlin told reporters. "Offensively, we were a beat off. Defensively, we gave up some big plays, and special teams, we gave up a fake. Our defense stopped them not just in overtime, but on the last couple series."
The biggest win of the week, though, came 48 hours before most of the nation's best were in action. Given the spotlight of a prime-time telecast on Thursday, UCLA finally seemed to click on all cylinders for the first time all season.
Brett Hundley accounted for 427 total yards (355 passing, 72 rushing) and five touchdowns and Ishmael Adams returned a kickoff and an interception for a score, as the Bruins earned a 62-27 thrashing of Arizona State. With Mike Bercovici in a rhythm early, UCLA fell behind 17-6 early in the second quarter and looked to be heading for another nail-biter.
But an 80-yard touchdown from Hundley to Eldridge Massington helped spark a 28-0 run to give UCLA the lead. The Bruins closed out the game on a 56-10 run, opening their Pac-12 schedule with an emphatic statement win.
"It's an absolute inspiration to offense, defense and special teams for him to not just play, but to be out jumping over guys and diving on the ground," UCLA defensive coordinator Jeff Ulbrich told reporters of Hundley, who was playing despite an arm injury.
Thursday's win was a far cry from UCLA's struggles to start the season. Despite facing three straight ranked opponents, Jim Mora's team was yet to win a game by more than one score. It'll be interesting to see whether the early struggles or the blowout was the aberration in the mix. The Bruins have what should be an easy matchup with Utah before their home showdown with Oregon on Oct. 11.
The escapist tendencies of their fellow ranked teams did not help South Carolina, which blew a 20-7 fourth-quarter lead in a loss to Missouri. Russell Hansbrough scored all three Missouri touchdowns, including consecutive one-yard punch-ins late in the fourth quarter.
The loss drops South Carolina to 3-2 on the season, including a 2-2 mark in the SEC. Viewed as a preseason favorite to win the SEC East, Steve Spurrier's Gamecocks are going to need a ton of help if they hope to re-enter the picture. Their schedule is relatively easy from an SEC perspective from here on out, but any plans of salvaging the 2014 campaign includes taking down Auburn on Oct. 25.
The Gamecocks and Sun Devils were the lone teams to drop outside the Top 16. They were replaced by Stanford and LSU.
Follow Tyler Conway (@tylerconway22) on Twitter
.jpg?w=480 "Ohio State Team Doctor")
