NCAA Football rankings: November 5, 2018

The full Badger Bracketology composite Markov Chain rankings are on the NCAAF rankings tab. The top 25 teams and the B1G teams are below. Some observations when we compare to last week’s rankings. First, we have a new #1 team (Alabama) after Alabama’s decisive win over LSU. Second, Notre Dame dropped from #4 to #5 after beating Northwestern because other teams had higher quality wins. A win does not guarantee that a team will not drop in the rankings. Third, my alma mater (Illinois) crushed Minnesota and only increased from #104 to #96…because a win against Minnesota does not appear to count for much. And finally, we have 5 B1G teams in the top 25. Not bad. 1 Alabama 2 Clemson 3 Michigan 4 Georgia 5 Notre Dame 6 LSU 7 Oklahoma 8 Kentucky 9 UCF 10 Ohio St 11 West Virginia 12 Washington St 13 Michigan St 14 Florida 15 Penn St 16 Mississippi St 17 Washington 18 Fresno St 19 Syracuse 20 Texas 21 Utah St 22 Army 23 Cincinnati 24 Iowa 25 Buffalo The B1G, ranked. 3 Michigan 10 Ohio St 13 Michigan St 15 Penn St 24 Iowa 29 Purdue 39 Northwestern 40 Wisconsin 53 Maryland 73 Indiana 77 Minnesota 92 Nebraska 96 Illinois 119 Rutgers