It’s late in the college football season, and thoughts of the College Football Playoff abound. What better time than now to jump from a top 10 to a top 15?
With that in mind, here are Joel Klatt’s top 15 rankings after another week of college football games.
1. Ohio State
Klatt’s take: Even without wide receiver Carnell Tate on the field, and without Jeremiah Smith late in the game, what did they do? Oh they just decided to run the football for 6.7 yards per carry, which is the most per carry that UCLA has given up since 2019. And yes they’ve had some great run defenses and everything, but I’m just saying that stat to tell you that everyone’s been lamenting this idea that Ohio State can’t run the football, and then they run it better against UCLA than anyone has this entire season, including Utah. So maybe Ohio State can run the football pretty well. They’ve certainly been efforting that over the last few weeks, and it’s not like they’ve just been sitting there throwing the ball. UCLA was totally overmatched. The Ohio State starters on defense gave up nothing, their defense overall gives up 10 and barely any yards – Ohio State is No. 1.
2. Indiana
Klatt’s take: Indiana beat Wisconsin 31-7, now they’ve got a bye. They can get healthy before they finish up their regular season against Purdue, and then likely the Big Ten Championship Game.
3. Georgia
Klatt’s take: Georgia moves up to No. 3. Georgia is the best team in the SEC right now. They’re hard to kill. I don’t want to see their quarterback, Gunner Stockton, I don’t want to see their coach. They got too much guts, they got too much physicality. I know they’re dealing with injuries – everybody is dealing with injuries. Every single team is dealing with injuries to a very important person on their team. I think Georgia is really good, I don’t want to see them in the playoff if I’m anybody.
4. Texas A&M
Klatt’s take: I moved Texas A&M, undefeated, down. I moved A&M down because that first half against South Carolina was awful. It was awful! And they come back, and I will give them credit for that, because, like Michigan, you can look at it two ways. Was it gross, or was it resilient? And I always try to lean optimistic, and I’m going to with Texas A&M as well. As bad as they were in the first half, you could chalk that up to not being focused and not being ready. But I think it’s as tough as anything to turn that on mid-game, and they were able to do that. QB Marcel Reed went from playing very poorly in the first half to playing great in the second half. They didn’t panic. And I mean it was barely the start of the fourth quarter before they were all the way back in that game. There’s no doubt that South Carolina is not a good football team, and A&M wasn’t focused early. And then no, no, no, don’t worry, they bailed themselves out, they got a win. And again, I will say when you need it most, can you play great? And they did.
5. Texas Tech
Klatt’s take: That is a complete team – they absolutely buried UCF, 48-9, holding another Big 12 team under 10 points. They did it against BYU, and now UCF. Shiel Wood is their defensive coordinator; he is absolutely a candidate for the Broyles Award as the top assistant in America. Ohio Stat’s Matt Patricia is going to be a candidate for the Broyles Award, but Shiel Wood, you talk about a drastic improvement on defense. Texas Tech has always been good on offense, but what he’s done on that defensive side is remarkable. Obviously, with the infusement of all those new players.
6. Oregon
Klatt’s take: Oregon wins it on Friday night, 42-13 against Minnesota, now they host USC. Watch out for Oregon. Listen, USC could go up there and beat them, but Oregon is one of those teams that has answers. They have won multiple different ways, they don’t have to play great in a specific area in order to win, which is why I think they can make some noise.
7. Ole Miss
Klatt’s take: Hard for me to believe in this Ole Miss team as a national title contender right now, but certainly, certainly a playoff team. Not a great performance against Florida, 37-27. They were in a dogfight against Florida, they were sloppy, they got bailed out by their run game. Quarterback Trinidad Chambliss made a couple of really bad throws. But, Ole Miss is a really good football team, obviously, and they made plays when they needed to. For the most part, though, it was a bit of a distracted team, and that was one of the things that I warned everyone about with this idea that coach Lane Kiffin has not committed to Ole Miss yet. Everybody else is taking extensions. Mike Elko now has an extension with A&M. The longer this goes, the more Ole Miss is going to be distracted. I know I keep saying that, but it’s because it’s true.
8. Oklahoma
Klatt’s take: OU goes up to No. 8. Big win over Bama – there’s OU with that defense. Now, I will say this about OU: my one concern is that they are going to have to play better on offense to be a real threat to contend for a national championship. I love the defense, I love the special teams. But, like Bama, you get in a matchup that’s not great for you, and it can go the other direction because there’s not a ton of answers there, at least right now offensively. Maybe QB John Mateer will get a little bit better and healthier with that hand as the playoffs were to roll on.
9. Notre Dame
Klatt’s take: What did you expect from Notre Dame and Pitt when the opposing coach Pat Narduzzi says, “We don’t care if we win or lose or if Notre Dame scores 110.” What a dumb comment. Like I’m sorry, I know that that sounds personal – it’s not meant to be personal. But you can’t say that as a coach! What are you doing? You can’t infuse an excuse into your locker room. What? So Notre Dame took care of business 37-15, and rightly so.
10. Alabama
Klatt’s take: After the loss to Oklahoma, Alabama is No. 10. I don’t think they’re a huge threat to win the national championship, but almost certainly they’re going to be in the college football playoff. If they make that SEC Championship game, even if they were to suffer a third loss, they would have the 10 wins to offset that. So I think that Bama just needs to take care of business, they should be fine finding themselves in the CFP.
11. BYU
Klatt’s take: Really impressive response by BYU after losing to Texas Tech. They came out there and hammered TCU, 44-13. I was watching that game Saturday night, and they could run it, they were throwing it – it was very, very impressive. Quarterback Bear Bachmeier is a heck of a player. Running back LJ Martin, that guy can absolutely get it done.
12. USC
Klatt’s take: After that big 26-21 win over Iowa, USC is No. 12. Love what they’re doing, and they’re set up perfectly because now they’ve got the ammunition in front of them with that Oregon game on Saturday. If they were 10-2, I think they would go. That’s a good football team. Kalani Sitake is as good of a coach as anybody in America.
13. Utah
Klatt’s take: Utah beat Baylor 55-28, and they’ve won their last three games by 46, 21 and 27 points. That’s a good football team right there, not a lot of teams want to face this Utah team right now. I don’t know if they’re going to have enough to get themselves all the way in the playoff, but man, that would be a dangerous playoff team. It really would be. I wouldn’t want to see them; they run it too well.
14. Texas
Klatt’s take: At No. 14, I’ve got Texas after Georgia defeated them 35-10 this past week. Even with the three losses, I think Texas is just ahead of the No. 15 team, just because of the youth on that team.
15. Michigan
Klatt’s take: Michigan is No. 15 in the country after eking out a 24-22 victory over Northwestern. I’m a little more optimistic about this team than others, even though they cannot play this way and feel like they’re going to win the rest of their games – and namely the game at the end of the year against Ohio State. They didn’t jump up, they were around there for me last week. So this is not me passing anybody – I’ve never given you a 15 to 11, this is about where they were last week, and this is where they are this week.
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