We made a silly mistake last week but we've fixed it, and we also had to reverse our own logic; let's dive into it.
We dropped Fresno State down below Cal Maritime last week. That was a dumb error—Fresno State had already beaten the Keehaulers. We just over-reacted to a big loss by Fresno, which is something we at GRR World Headquarters have to keep an eye on.
As it turned out, all of that was a harbinger for another correction, as Cal Maritime lost to Stanford. Now, we didn't have Stanford ranked because they had lost big in their opening game. But that big loss was to American River, and that's a bit harsh to be judged that way. So Cal Maritime drops to #25, and Stanford comes in at #24.
The teams that had occupied #24 and #25 are out. Both lost and this was the part about our logic. We went into deep explanation-world about how Oregon State and Washington should be ranked ahead of Boise State and Oregon. But Boise State did what they needed to do by beating OSU this week. Overall, despite an earlier big loss to OSU, Boise State has done enough, we think, to get into the rankings. And we've going to have to chalk up that earlier OSU loss to a bad week.
For now.
So ... Oregon or Oregon State or Washington? The easiest thing to do would be to drop all three out but we're not going to do that. We could have them all tied. We're not going to do that, either. Oregon State beat Oregon, but lost to Washington, who split 1-1 with Oregon. Oregon has a forfeit loss to Boise State but that was weather and schedule-related, not because they could get it together to play.
So the question is, do we value October 26, 2024 OSU 26 Oregon 12 over February 8, 2025 Oregon 14 Washington 12. And if we value Oregon State's win, what about that October 19 Oregon win over Western Washington that we kind of threw out?
Right now, then, we decided to put Oregon back in the rankings. However, this could easily change.
Oklahoma bumps up a spot but we suspect they deserve to be much higher.
