College Football Rankings: 4 Ranked Teams That Will Lose in Week 3

In Week 2 of the best regular season in all of sports, three college football teams ranked in the top 25 went down, and I’m here to tell you that four more ranked teams will fall in Week 3.

There are two games that match up ranked opponents against one another, so that’s two ranked teams falling there. Two more ranked teams will fall as there are plenty of trap games this weekend.

The No. 6 team in the nation, Stanford, will travel to Arizona in a game that should have quarterback Andrew Luck and company on upset alert.

That’s not the only game that could spell upset this weekend as No. 17 Ohio State travels to Miami in the “ineligi-bowl.”

That was wrong of me to say. It’s never good to kick a man when he's down, just ask Jordan Jefferson. Anyway, that’s beside the point, and those aren’t the only teams who should be put on notice.

How about the No. 15 ranked Michigan State Spartans taking on Notre Dame in South Bend or a gritty Tennessee team taking on the No. 16 ranked team, Florida? These are the ranked teams that will fall in Week 3.

No. 25 Mississippi State

Dan Mullen and the Mississippi State Bulldogs really needed to beat Auburn this past Saturday to prove to the SEC that they were a legitimate contender in the conference, and things go from bad to worse when LSU comes into town on Thursday night.

Quarterback Jarrett Lee and LSU’s running game are giving the Tigers the spark on offense that they’ve been missing the past three seasons. Not only are they clicking on offense, but they’re defense is playing lights out.

After playing against one of the best offenses in the nation, Oregon, and an unimpressive Northwestern State team, the Tigers rank first in the SEC and eighth in the nation in rushing defense after allowing only 45.5 yards per game.

This should worry the Bulldogs, because whether it’s quarterback Chris Relf running the ball or running backs Vick Ballard and LaDarius Perkin, running is their forte.

The Bulldogs are ranked sixth in the nation in rushing yards, averaging 321 yards per game. The Bulldogs won’t be able to get their offense going in this one, and the Tigers pull away in the fourth quarter to beat the Bulldogs.

Predicted Score

LSU                         31

Miss. State              20

No. 23 Texas

All right, before you go throw a fit and start commenting as to why I’m a fool for picking this game, let me explain myself.

UCLA was supposed to be the surprise team in Pac-12 this year, and they lost their first game to a talented Houston team. Even though this team is 1-1 and hasn’t looked overly impressive, I still believe this team will shock the Longhorns.

UCLA has a quarterback in Richard Brehaut who has shown that he’s capable of getting the job done through the air, and the Bruins have two running backs in Derrick Coleman and Jonathan Franklin who can torch a defense with any given space.

The Bruins rank 16th in the nation when it comes to rushing yards per game with 252, so the thought of the Bruins being successful running the ball on the Longhorns isn’t absurd.

As for Texas, they haven’t been overly impressive either. Fans are still waiting on quarterback Garrett Gilbert to emerge and be the guy to lead Texas back to the promised land, but it just isn’t happening.

UCLA pulls off the upset Saturday.

Predicted Score

Texas                     24
UCLA                     27

No. 16 Florida

I’ve been saying it all preseason that Tennessee is a dark horse in the SEC East, and hopefully they’ve grabbed the attention of the casual college football fan by now.

If you missed quarterback Tyler Bray’s performance then you missed one heckuva performance, as Bray threw for over 400 yards with five total touchdowns.

For Florida to have any chance, they’re going to have to shut down running back Tauren Poole and force Bray into some uncomfortable positions in hopes of him making mistakes.

As for Florida, the loss of Janoris Jenkins hasn’t hurt them thus far as their defense ranks first in the nation in points scored against them with an average of 1.5.

Offensively, John Brantley hasn’t looked amazing, but he hasn’t looked terrible either. The Gators have mostly ridden the back of Chris Rainey as he leads the team in both rushing and receiving.

This is going to be a great game between two marquee programs looking to get back to doing what they do best, and that’s win. Bray and the Vols pull it off in what is going to be an instant classic in The Swamp.

Predicted Score

Tennessee            21

Florida                  17

No. 5 Florida State

This is it. This is without a doubt one of the biggest games of the year, and like LSU versus Oregon, it’s happening early in the season.

Most of the time when two top-ranked teams face off against each other, you’ll see most analysts go with the safe pick and pick the home team to be the victor.

Well, I’m not playing this one safe. I think both of these teams are great, but I think Oklahoma is ranked No. 1 for a reason.

They are the most complete team in the nation as they have an offense that could go off and produce 40-plus points on any given Saturday to go along with a defense that has the ability to shut down most offenses in the nation. Up until this point, Florida State has two lopsided victories over weak competition, and Oklahoma has a credible 47-14 victory over Tulsa.

Both of these defenses will bring it in this one, and the game will come down to which team has better quarterback play.

E.J Manuel is a great quarterback for the Seminoles, but I’ll take Oklahoma’s Landry Jones any day of the week over Manuel. Jones and his favorite target Ryan Broyles lead the Sooners to a huge victory over a great Seminoles team.  

Predicted Score

Oklahoma                   35

Florida State               27