College Football's Top 8 Teams -- Version 2.0

Two weeks of great football have passed and teams continue to develop their identities as we move to the home stretch of the college football regular season. In that period of time, the SEC has proven to be the most balanced conference while the USC Trojans have had two late scares at home to unranked Washington and Arizona St.

Meanwhile, the BCS rankings came out yesterday and demonstrated the computer rankings' infatuation with USC -- likely buoyed by an opening game win at Arkansas. Like 2 weeks ago, Matt Carroll (mcarroll@dewberry.com) provides insight and reasoning behind his top 8.

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1) Ohio State: Still above the rest. No problems handling their games the last two weeks. The defense continues to get better as they get more game experience. There are no questions on the offensive side of the ball. They have made it through the first half of their schedule and should now coast to the Michigan game on Nov. 18th

2) Michigan: Got a big win in Happy Valley to keep their national championship hopes alive, and did so without their star WR Mario Manningham. The offense showed depth with WRs Adrian Arrington and Steve Breaston getting 83 and 79 yards receiving, respectively, and RB Mike Hart's 6th 100-yard rushing game this season against a stout PSU defense. But it is the Michigan D that proved they can control a game, with their front 7 making a strong case as the best in the nation with 7 sacks, also knocking out PSU's first- and second-string QBs.

3) Louisville: I think this is the team that ends up undefeated and on the outside of the BCS bubble. Their last two wins have been less than convincing, but the 2nd half of their game against Middle Tenn. St. shows how good they can be. They have three tough games in a row coming up, so we will find out for ourselves how great this team really is. WR Mario Urrutia (fun last name to say) is emerging as a great scoring weapon and should become even more of a threat as QB Brian Brohm works his way back.

4) Florida: This is a great team on offense and defense. A two-QB system that is actually working (for now), and a good RB in Wynn. LSU laid an egg against this team in The Swamp, but Florida took advantage of those mistakes to score a good win. They played very well against Auburn and dominated for the most part, but were unable to recover from the momentum swing off of the blocked punt. As I said previously, this is the toughest schedule in the country, so if they can win out -- as they should -- this one-loss team will be the best in the land.

5) Auburn: How could a team that just beat Florida be ranked below them? Because they are not as good as Florida is. They had a great win on Saturday, but last Saturday they were absolutely dominated by Arkansas. Stat of the week: 3 -- the number of pass attempts for Arkansas in the 2nd half. And only 10 pass attempts total. That is the definition of smashmouth football. This was after they squeaked by an inferior South Carolina team that went down to the last play of the game. My last post said Auburn could be in trouble if they were losing late because they don't have the passing attack and that showed against Arkansas.

6) Cal: This team has looked phenomenal after Week 1. Just like Arkansas, a completely different team from the first game of the season. They have dominated every opponent since. Impressive wins against Oregon and Arizona State. They had no problem beating ASU and WSU, which USC did. Nate Longshore is playing fabulous, and DeSean Jackson is a one of the best WRs in the nation that deserves more attention than he is getting.

7) USC: This team has not played like a top 5 team, in my opinion. Three straight games that have all gone down to the wire against three unranked teams, with two of them at home. The team has not lost, but has looked quite vulnerable. Their defense is not causing turnovers which has many a Trojan fan worried. They have two games to get their act together before they play Oregon, Cal, and Notre Dame. Lucky for them -- they are all at home.

8) WVU: The offense is phemonenal and the spread attack is incredibly hard to defend. Pat White had a field day against Syracuse. But the defense continues to disappoint. There were several plays that they gave up to Syracuse which made them look pathetic, most notably a couple of deep balls against the secondary that came off of desperation throws from Perry Patterson. It will be interesting to see what a Louisville offense can do to them.

On the Radar: Texas, Tennesee, Notre Dame
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Key Games in the Next 2 Weeks
Oct. 21:
#5 Texas @ #17 Nebraska
#13 Georgia Tech @ #12 Clemson
#6 Louisville @ Syracuse

Oct. 28:
Georgia v. #9 Florida
#7 Tennessee @ South Carolina