The No. 6 Oregon Ducks just took a trip across the country to play in a night game against one of the highest ranked teams in all of college football and in one of the toughest environments that this sport has to offer. And it’s worth noting that Dan Lanning and the Ducks were able to come out on top.
It took overtime, but Oregon was able to get a win over James Franklin and the No. 3 Penn State Nittany Lions during a white out game on Saturday.
That’s an impressive thing to do. It’s just not easily done and it certainly didn’t look easy for the Ducks to do. This was a close game all throughout (as evidenced by the overtime portion of this game). But because Oregon just beat the No. 3 team in the country, we’re almost certainly going to see the AP Poll Top 25 rankings (especially the Top 10 teams) get shuffled around a bit.
How will that impact Joey McGuire and Texas Tech, who are currently sitting just outside the Top 10 at No. 12?
AP Poll Top 25 college football rankings: How does Penn State’s loss to Oregon impact Texas Tech’s ranking?
To help figure some of this out, we need to take a deeper look at what the rankings looked like heading into this week:
- Ohio State Buckeyes
- Miami Hurricanes
- Penn State Nittany Lions
- LSU Tigers
- Georgia Bulldogs
- Oregon Ducks
- Oklahoma Sooners
- FSU Seminoles
- Texas A&M Aggies
- Texas Longhorns
- Indiana Hoosiers
- Texas Tech Red Raiders
- Ole Miss Rebels
- Iowa State Cyclones
- Tennessee Vols
- Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets
- Alabama Crimson Tide
- Vanderbilt Commodores
- Michigan Wolverines
- Missouri Tigers
- USC Trojans
- Notre Dame Fighting Irish
- Illinois Fighting Illini
- TCU Horned Frogs
- BYU Cougars
Almost certainly, we’re going to see Oregon jump a bit. Given that two teams in front of them lost to other opponents and Oregon handled the No. 3 team, it wouldn’t be shocking to see the Ducks snag either the No. 2 or the No. 3 spots in the rankings.
But what does that mean for Penn State?
Well, they certainly weren’t the only AP Poll Top 10-ranked team to suffer a loss on Saturday. They had plenty of company. And more than likely, given that this game went to overtime, we’re going to see the Nittany Lions hanging around the Top 10 still.
Should that happen, we might still have the Red Raiders on the outside looking in of the Top 10 for at least one more week. Whether or not that’s fair (I don’t think it is), I suspect it’ll be the case. And that kinda stinks.