Should we be ranked higher?

It's a popular topic these days. After all, we're 4-0, we had an excellent win against Cal and we won handily on the road against BYU. Why are we only 25th, and why did it take so long to get there in the first place? The answer, as always, lies in the details - namely, who's above us? Let's go through the list and see who we're subjectively superior to.

24. Michigan State (4-0): Three wins against otherwise forgettable programs (Western Michigan, Florida Atlantic, and Northern Colorado), and an exciting win against a talented but luckless Notre Dame team, with the fake field goal at the end playing on SportsCenter for a week.

Verdict: Overrated. If it weren't for that win against Notre Dame, they probably wouldn't be here. The good news is that they're playing Wisconsin this week, so there's a very real chance they'll fall back to Earth. The bad news is that they're playing the same Wisconsin team that nearly lost to Arizona State and let San Jose State look surprisingly decent in week 2.

23. North Carolina State (4-0): Ah, the one-word Wolfpack. Their schedule looks pretty similar to ours - two victories over mediocre programs (Western Carolina and UCF), followed by two wins against somewhat better competition (Cincinnati and Georgia Tech).

Verdict: Push. You could make a credible case that our wins are a bit more impressive than theirs, but only a bit. Cincinnati's record is dismal, but they've played some excellent schools; this puts them roughly on par with BYU. Georgia Tech, meanwhile, was #15 in the country until Kansas stunned them into submission. Since then, Georgia Tech has been somewhat mercurial. Then again, Cal has proved its reputation was a little overblown once they stopped playing UC Davis and Colorado.

22. Penn State (3-1): Two wins against forgettable programs (Youngstown State and Kent State), a come-from-behind win against a halfway decent Temple team (they beat Connecticut), and an absolute pasting by Alabama.

Verdict: Overrated. Temple's better than usual, but it's still not that good. Having to come from behind to put them away, especially at home, is certainly not the sign of an excellent football program. This ranking is more of an acknowledgement of last year's successes than a reflection of this year's accomplishments. Don't be surprised if they lose in Iowa this Saturday and consequently drop out of the ratings.

21. Texas (3-1): For the record, I am not a Texas fan. In fact, if Texas played UNLV in a football game, I would root for a meteor, a stray nuclear strike, or the hand of God to come down and smite both teams before I'd voluntarily root for either of them. Having acknowledged my bias, I will note that Texas beat two mediocre teams (Rice and Wyoming), beat a halfway decent Texas Tech team on the road, then promptly bathed themselves in bruin feces and unwittingly made our Pistol-offense-originating nemesis/raison d'être look like a tactical genius of the first order.

Mixed emotions, I have decided, are the best emotions.

Verdict: Dazed and confused. Nobody, and I mean nobody, was expecting them to lose to UCLA at home. Considering how Texas was #7 in the country until that game, I'd say a fourteen point drop is about right. It would've been worse if UCLA didn't beat Houston before facing off against Texas. We'll see if Texas is actually any good this year when they play in the Red River Shootout this weekend.

20. South Carolina (3-1): The Gamecocks' win against Georgia looked impressive at the time; unfortunately, Georgia's loss to Mississippi State last week didn't add any polish to that. South Carolina also suffered a close loss to an excellent (#17) Auburn team thanks to a bit of foot-directed sharpshooting in the fourth quarter. South Carolina's other two wins against Furman and Southern Miss, meanwhile, look utterly forgettable - remember, Southern Miss is the same team that nearly lost to Louisiana Tech last week to the tune of 13-12.

Verdict: Push. Auburn is definitely better than Cal, and Georgia's three losses were to the same Arkansas team that took Alabama to the wire last week, South Carolina, and an understandable letdown game against Mississippi State. Consequently, it's pretty safe to conclude that South Carolina has played better teams than Nevada. On the other hand, they're also 3-1, so this ranking is about right.

19. Michigan (4-0): A close win against the same talented but luckless Notre Dame team that Michigan State beat a week later, a strong victory over Bowling Green and a decent win against Connecticut are the highlights of Michigan's season so far. Too bad they almost pulled an Appalachian State against UMass a few weeks ago.

Verdict: Overrated. I'm not even sure they're better than Michigan State. Connecticut isn't very good, and Bowling Green rests comfortably between Colorado State and New Mexico in talent. Yes, they had a close win against Notre Dame, but who hasn't? Let's also remember that Michigan almost forgot its lesson about properly preparing against FCS-level competition when it faced the indomitable Minutemen of Massachusetts. Granted, we didn't play much better against Eastern Washington, but play better we did, and we didn't need over 100,000 fans on our side to do it, either.

18. USC (4-0): This is where things start getting a little interesting. Is Washington State any better than Colorado State? Is Minnesota any better than the University of South Dakota (Answer: No.)? Will Virginia play any other Division I-A... err... "FBS"-level opponent other than than USC before conference play (Answer: No.)? Is Hawaii any good (Answer: I have no idea.)?

Verdict: Overrated. Is USC any good this year? It's hard to tell - they simply haven't played anyone. On the other hand, Kiffen has made it an open "secret" that he's playing for depth in the early parts of the season, so USC might be semi-intentionally playing down to their level of competition. It's just really difficult to get a good read right now. The good news is they're playing a decent Washington team this week, followed by a gut check against #9 Stanford in Palo Alto.

Trivia question: When was the last time that Stanford was ranked higher than USC when they played?
The answer: October 25, 1986 - Stanford was ranked #19 in the AP Poll while USC wasn't ranked that week. USC won 10-0, which advanced them to #18 in the rankings. Stanford's coach in that game? Jack Elway, the father of some obscure former quarterback for the Denver Broncos that nobody's ever heard of. USC, meanwhile, was in the final year of the Ted Tollner era; he would eventually finish his coaching career at San Diego State.

Back to the list...

17. Iowa (3-1): Similar story as USC, with high scoring wins against Eastern Illinois, Iowa State, and Ball State, as well as a close loss against a good Arizona team on the road.

Verdict: Overrated, but possibly not for long. The Hawkeyes' next four games are against Penn State, Michigan, Wisconsin, and Michigan State, which will go a long way toward determining which of the teams on this list are for real and which ones are there out of a sense of misguided tradition. If they win all four games, they will be a top-10 team and deservedly so. If the Hawkeyes are really lucky, they'll be undefeated going into their game against Ohio State on November 20th - if they are, that will probably be an unofficial Big Ten championship game, in much the same way that our November 26th game against Boise State might turn into an unofficial WAC championship. As an added bonus for the Hawkeyes, their game against Ohio State is at home.

From here on out, it's fairly obvious that, even if the teams above Iowa are overrated (looking at you, Hurricanes), they're not overrated enough for me to make a credible argument that Nevada should be ranked higher than them. If you want to argue that we're a better team than #16 Miami (FL) or any of the rest of the list, you may do so in the comments section.