Scott Sands interviewed me (click here) about our college football rankings of the Big Ten and the Mid-American. I noted that critics of the SEC often complain that they never play road games, so that I would expect there to be a lot of Toledo Rockets fans around the country when they have the rare opportunity for a smaller conference team to try to knock off an SEC team at home when Missouri visits.
Big Ten fans in particular have long complained about the disadvantage their teams face due to almost all Bowl Games being virtually road games against Southern or California teams, and many would love nothing more than to see their little brothers in the Mid-American conference pull the big upset against a team that played in the SEC title game last year.
A big upset by Toledo could give the Rockets the early inside track to claim the one New Year’s Day bowl spot reserved for the champion of one of the five champions of the smaller conferences. Central Florida appeared to be the top candidate until they fell just short against Penn State on a neutral field, and UT San Antonio also gets a shot at home against a big conference when Arizona of the Pac-12 comes to town.
Right now the highest-ranked team from any of the smaller conferences is East Carolina, who faces a very tough game in traveling to South Carolina this weekend.
Football expert Cole Muzio’s Top 25 appears here, while the formula-driven ranking of all 128 teams appears here.