College Football Rankings: Predicting What the Week 5 Poll Should Look Like

The 2011 college football season is rolling into Week 5, and we have had a lot of craziness so far in the young season. 

The year is shaping up to be one full of madness and chaos as elite teams have been knocked off from the polls on a regular basis. 

Boise State is, well, still Boise State.  Ohio State is out of the rankings for the first time in almost a decade, and Clemson is proving to be a giant killer as they have beaten the defending national champion Auburn Tigers and also defeated the Florida State Seminoles in back-to-back contests that should vault Clemson well into the Top 25.

Oklahoma survived an early challenge from the Missouri Tigers, and Alabama crushed Arkansas to surely remain as one of the top-two teams in the country and in the BCS. 

The LSU Tigers surely have made their case to be No. 1 as they have knocked off three ranked opponents in as many weeks, and they have made that case by leaning on their dominant defense and the game-managing skills of QB Jarrett Lee. 

Michigan and Michigan State are both ranked for the first time in a long time, and those two teams will likely knock the stuffing out of each other when they meet in East Lansing on October 15.

Finally, the Nebraska Cornhuskers are seemingly re-emerging as a national force as they are ranked in the Top 10 and are bullying their way toward their first BCS bowl appearance since losing the 2001 Rose Bowl to the top-ranked Miami Hurricanes.

Here is my projection for the week's new Top 25:

1. Oklahoma                 16. Arkansas

2. LSU                          17. West Virginia

3. Alabama                   18. Clemson

4. Boise State               19. Michigan 

5. Wisconsin                 20. TCU

6. Oklahoma State        21. Florida State

7. Stanford                    22. Georgia Tech

8. Nebraska                  23. Illinois

9. Oregon                     24. Arizona State

10. South Carolina         25. Auburn

11. South Florida

12.Florida

13. Baylor

14. Virginia Tech

15. Texas