This will be a weekly feature this season on ATQ, where we round up the winners and losers of the week in college football, then reveal our BlogPoll ballot to the nation.
THIS WEEK'S WINNERS
1) Brigham Young -- I'm guessing they scheduled this game for the paycheck. But a win? That's a cherry on top. The Cougar defense reeled in the vaunted Sooner offense, and their offense did just enough to get by Oklahoma. But the real reason they are the big winners is simple; with Florida State, TCU, and Utah still on the schedule, they are first non-BCS school that could run the table and have the strength of schedule to make a legitimate claim for a spot in the national title game. Picture this scenario: Florida and BYU run the table, SC and Cal both have a loss and are out of the picture, and Oklahoma beats Texas to have both of those teams with one loss. Assuming no surprise undefeateds, how do you justify leaving BYU out?
2) Boise State -- They have a much easier shot than BYU at going undefeated, having just won the only tough game on their schedule. While I would argue that the odds of them winning out is less than 50/50, doing so likely guarantees them a spot in the BCS (unless BYU go undefeated as well).
3) Washington -- Technically, the Huskies didn't win their game this week, but that's almost an afterthought. To be competetitive against an upper echelon SEC team was all they could ask for, and they probably should have beaten them. We can't take too much out of one game, but UW showed that they are a long way from the team that finished 0-12 last year.
4) Cincinnati -- I think the general consensus was that it was going to be either Cincy or Rutgers winning the Big East this year. After completely dominating the hapless Scarlet Knights in Piscataway, you have to think that Cincy is in the driver's seat for another Orange Bowl.
5) Idaho -- They got that first win of the season out of the way early. Which is good, because they may not win another one.
THIS WEEK'S LOSERS
1) The ACC -- Year after year, the ACC shows that they are just flat out behind the other power conferences, and opening week was no exception. The ACC played four OOC games against other BCS schools (South Carolina at NC State, Maryland at Cal, Baylor at Wake Forest, and Alabama vs. Virginia Tech. They lost them all. To make matters worse not one, but two ACC schools (Duke and Virginia) lost to 1-AA teams at home. Only a week into the season, we know that this conference stinks yet again.
2) Oklahoma -- You get all the first round picks to come back only to find out that your offensive line sucks, you Heisman winning QB injured his shoulder, and your national championship hopes have been crippled in the first week of the season. Of course, I 'm not feeling the least bit badly for Bob Stoops.
3) Oregon -- I'm going to stop here, we don't need to cry.
4) Colorado -- Lost to Colorado State again to start the season, and looked pretty woeful doing so. Will Groh or Hawkins be the first BCS coach fired this season? (And how hard it is to believe that CU was a power at the beginning of the decade. How the mighty have fallen).
5) Illinois -- So much for that darkhorse Big 10 contender.
Here's the blogpoll. I prefer to rank teams on merit, based on what they've actually accomplished. This is why a team like BYU is ranked so high--nobody in college football has a better quality win then they do. However, there are limitations to this. For example, Florida still has to be #1 even though they only beat Charleston Southern. So in the early going its kind of a hybrid. For the bottom part of the poll, I tried to reward teams that actually beat somebody, but these rankings are very fluid. I don't believe in the whole "you can't be demoted if you win" garbage, which is why Ohio State was penalized for looking bad against Navy. Meanwhile, teams like BYU, Miami, and Cincinnati got rewarded for actually playing somebody, while teams like Pitt and Kansas were passed up for playing patsies.
Here is the poll:
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| Rank | Team | Delta |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Florida | |
| 2 | Southern Cal | |
| 3 | Texas | |
| 4 | Alabama |
 3 |
| 5 | Oklahoma State |
3 |
| 6 | California |
3 |
| 7 | Brigham Young |
14 |
| 8 | Mississippi |
 2 |
| 9 | Penn State |
4 |
| 10 | Oklahoma |
6 |
| 11 | Boise State |
5 |
| 12 | Virginia Tech |
2 |
| 13 | Ohio State |
2 |
| 14 | Georgia |
1 |
| 15 | LSU | |
| 16 | TCU |
2 |
| 17 | Miami (Florida) | |
| 18 | Missouri | |
| 19 | Cincinnati | |
| 20 | Notre Dame | |
| 21 | Stanford |
3 |
| 22 | Nebraska | |
| 23 | Michigan | |
| 24 | Oregon State |
6 |
| 25 | Georgia Tech |
8 |
| Last week's ballot | ||