BCS Rankings: LSU-Alabama and Games Sure to Shake Up Next Week's Standings
If you think the week-to-week shift in the BCS rankings has been crazy so far through the 2011 college football season, just wait and see what happens after Week 10. The national championship picture could clear up a bit...or look more confusing than one of Pablo Picasso's abstract masterpieces.
Either way, you can be sure the standings will spark plenty of debate, thanks in large part to these blockbuster matchups.
LSU at Alabama
.jpg?w=256 "Ohio State Team Doctor")
Remember all those nonperishable goods ESPN's been telling you to store up for the last few weeks? Well, now's a good time to bust them out because you just might need them to survive the aftermath of LSU's trip to Alabama.
Quarterbacks will get sacked, coach speak will go right out the window and the SEC...nay, college football as we know it will never be the same.
Okay, so maybe this game won't be that dramatic but it will have a pretty big impact on the BCS standings. Whichever team wins will find itself in prime position to not only win the SEC West, but also march its way down to New Orleans for the BCS National Championship Game.
The Crimson Tide will have the home-field advantage, but the Tigers, with their duo of quarterbacks in Jarrett Lee and Jordan Jefferson and the return of Tyrann Mathieu from suspension, have the slightest of edges in actual manpower and talent.
South Carolina at Arkansas
Elsewhere in the SEC, No. 9 South Carolina and No. 7 Arkansas will face off in a battle of one-loss teams that is guaranteed reshape both the SEC and the national conversation.
On the one hand are the Gamecocks, who control their own destiny in the SEC East but remain highly vulnerable after losing Marcus Lattimore for the season to a knee injury and Stephen Garcia to his usual knuckleheadedness.
On the other are the Razorbacks, who need Alabama to lose to LSU this weekend to have any shot at winning the SEC West. Tyler Wilson and company ought to enjoy the comforts of home after escaping upsets against Ole Miss and Vanderbilt away from Fayetteville.
While both teams from the Bama-LSU game could still be in the national title hunt after Saturday, the loser of Arkansas-USC will find itself on the outside looking in and without much of a shot of cracking the BCS as an at-large team.
Kansas State at Oklahoma State
Saturday's Big 12 clash between No. 14 Kansas State and No. 3 Oklahoma State could have a big impact on who plays the winner of Bama-LSU for the crystal football.
If everything goes as expected, the Cowboys will finish the season undefeated, with the Big 12 title in hand and a trip to New Orleans booked on account of their first-ever BCS berth.
But, college football is quite the fickle institution, one in which the unexpected must always be expected. K-State certainly didn't expect to endure such a swift second-half whooping at home against Oklahoma, though the result hardly came as a surprise to outside spectators.
Yet, the Wildcats still only dropped six spots in the standings, thanks to the favorable calculations of the BCS computers. I can only imagine how much those same computers will like the 'Cats after the Pokes prod them to no end in Stillwater this weekend.
| 1 | LSU | .9734 |
| 2 | Alabama | .9591 |
| 3 | Oklahoma State | .9310 |
| 4 | Stanford | .8615 |
| 5 | Boise State | .8522 |
| 6 | Oklahoma | .7760 |
| 7 | Arkansas | .7033 |
| 8 | Oregon | .6916 |
| 9 | South Carolina | .6177 |
| 10 | Nebraska | .6156 |
| 11 | Clemson | .596 |
| 12 | Virginia Tech | .568 |
| 13 | Houston | .470 |
| 14 | Kansas State | .460 |
| 15 | Michigan | .451 |
| 16 | Penn State | .402 |
| 17 | Michigan State | .308 |
| 18 | Georgia | .290 |
| 19 | Arizona State | .236 |
| 20 | Wisconsin | .216 |
| 21 | Texas | .212 |
| 22 | Auburn | .149 |
| 23 | Georgia Tech | .128 |
| 24 | West Virginia | .114 |
| 25 | Southern Mississippi | .094 |
.jpg?w=480 "Ohio State Team Doctor")
