Florida State, Clemson, and Virginia Tech hit the skids
It was quite an entertaining first week for the ACC. Well aligned to what happened on the field, Florida State, Clemson, and Virginia Tech each tumbled significantly in the SP+ rankings. The Seminoles and Tigers were the two teams across all of FBS that saw their ratings suffer the most with 10.0 and 9.0 drops, respectively.
SP+ was very impressed with Louisville’s waxing of an inferior Austin Peay from the FCS. I mean, it was an impressive win, as noted in this week’s Power Rankings, but I’m thinking a few bottles of Kentucky’s finest must have recently found their way to Bill Connelly’s door.
NC State’s rating and ranking both dipped after an underwhelming performance against FCS foe Western Carolina (the rating dropped by 3.7 points; the ranking by 8 spots). That’s to be expected. This week against Tennessee will provide an obvious opportunity for the Wolfpack to improve those figures, but a win is most important.
Despite two of the expected league heavyweights sinking like rocks, it was a good week for the ACC. Only Stanford sits with a negative rating, which is impressive given there are now 17 teams in the conference. Having only one school with a negative rating matches both the SEC and Big XII and is better than the two teams that the Big Ten sports on the wrong side of the 0.0 divide.