College Football Rankings 2016: Records for Top 25 Teams and Week 2 Standings

The first week of the 2016 college football did anything but disappoint. Alabama issued USC a historic beatdown, Texas is back, and LSU might be rethinking that whole "bringing Les Miles back" thing.

Oh, and Houston is suddenly an early favorite for a playoff spot.

Everything is topsy-turvy and upside down, which is perhaps more of a playoff product than anything. Week 1 used to be filled with favorites playing glorified exhibition games against cupcakes hoping to get squashed and pick up checks. But that's changed in the playoff era, which has placed a greater emphasis on strength of schedule and led to some nonconference instant classics.

Do we get two overtimes of Texas-Notre Dame in 2006? Is Oklahoma hitting the road to play a dangerous mid-major Houston team in 1996? What about Ole Miss and Florida State putting their early-season resumes on the line in 1986?

Probably not!

All of this led to some of the biggest changes from preseason to Week 2 in recent memory. Four ranked teams (Houston, Washington, Georgia and Louisville) each moved up six or more spots. Four (Wisconsin, Texas, Texas A&M and Miami) jostled their way into the Top 25.

"I think it's beautiful," UCLA coach Jim Mora, whose Bruins lost to Texas A&M and are now unranked, told David Wharton of the Los Angeles Times. "You talk about generating interest in college football right off the bat."

Unfortunately, interest won't be at quite the same level for the second weekend. Looking at the schedule, it's almost as if college football realized the NFL was coming and decided to take a rest week.

Ranking	Team (First-Place Votes)	Record	Points
1	Alabama (54)	1-0	1518
2	Clemson (2)	1-0	1416
3	Florida State (4)	1-0	1413
4	Ohio State	1-0	1324
5	Michigan (1)	1-0	1261
6	Houston	1-0	1243
7	Stanford	1-0	1140
8	Washington	1-0	884
9	Georgia	1-0	877
10	Wisconsin	1-0	759
11	Texas	1-0	743
12	Michigan State	1-0	722
13	Louisville	1-0	686
14	Oklahoma	0-1	664
15	TCU	1-0	635
16	Iowa	1-0	588
17	Tennessee	1-0	573
18	Notre Dame	0-1	528
19	Ole Miss	0-1	493
20	Texas A&M	1-0	477
21	LSU	0-1	423
22	Oklahoma State	1-0	409
23	Baylor	1-0	296
24	Oregon	1-0	242
25	Miami	1-0	137

Twenty-three ranked teams are on the schedule for this weekend. None of them are squaring off head-to-head. The best matchup of the weekend is arguably Virginia Tech-Tennessee, which is really only the case because of the novelty factor of playing at a race track.

The Vols and Hokies are slated to play at Bristol Motor Speedway, which sounds like those times college basketball teams tried playing on boats. Things did not go well.

The game was announced a while ago, so one would assume every precaution has been taken to make things safe. But we're a month removed from the NFL having to cancel the Hall of Fame Game because paint made the field too hard. Are we really all that certain throwing a football field on top of a concrete surface designed for massive vehicles to drive 150 mph over it is going to be foolproof?

Jerry Caldwell, the vice president of the speedway, seems to think things will go off without a hitch, per Chuck Culpepper of the Washington Post:

"

We're a football stadium on steroids, that's what I say. And it's really what we are. It was fun early on in the (three-year) process to see that kind of confirmed by the folks at Tennessee and Virginia Tech that had not been here before. When they came into the facility, they were blown away like, 'No, this is great.' I remember one of the guys at Tennessee had not been over. We were getting close to finalizing things. And (Tennessee Athletic Director) Dave Hart asked him, "Why don't you go over and check things out? Just get a feel for it and make sure we're comfortable with everything." And he came over and as soon as he walked in he said, "Man, my concerns are gone. That's all this place is, is a big football stadium."

"

Even if that's the case, let's just say some of the seats for that game aren't exactly field level:

The rest of the weekend is mostly one of shrug-emojiness. TCU and Arkansas would seem more exciting if the Razorbacks weren't a week removed from needing a late fourth-quarter touchdown to beat Louisiana Tech. 

Pitt-Penn State may somehow wind up on the national marquee despite neither team being likely to finish with more than seven wins this season. It's one of those weekends when you take your non-football-loving significant other on a nice couples Saturday before you begin hunkering down Sunday.

After all the glitz and glamour of the first week, expect a second week full of retro drubbings more fitting of a past era.