Four Top 10 teams took an L over the weekend in college football -- but our beloved Iowa Hawkeyes, of course, very much did not. They beat the brakes off formerly 4-0 Maryland on Friday night. That left him in an ideal position to sit back and watch the carnage unfold on Saturday as #3 Oregon, #8 Arkansas, #9 Notre Dame, and #10 Florida all tasted defeat. #6 Oklahoma (#4 in the Coaches Poll) flirted with a loss as well, but managed to escape Kansas State instead.
From a rankings standpoint, the loss by Oregon was the most meaningful one for the Hawkeyes since the Ducks were the only team ahead of Iowa to lose this week. But that loss, coupled with Iowa thrashing Maryland on the road while Penn State had a more subdued victory (at least by the final score) at home over Indiana proved to be enough to push Iowa up to #3 in the new AP rankings.
| RANK | TEAM | RECORD | PTS |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Alabama (53) | 5-0 | 1541 |
| 2 | Georgia (9) | 5-0 | 1497 |
| 3 | Iowa | 5-0 | 1381 |
| 4 | Penn State | 5-0 | 1360 |
| 5 | Cincinnati | 4-0 | 1320 |
| 6 | Oklahoma | 5-0 | 1248 |
| 7 | Ohio State | 4-1 | 1094 |
| 8 | Oregon | 4-1 | 1069 |
| 9 | Michigan | 5-0 | 1053 |
| 10 | BYU | 5-0 | 990 |
| 11 | Michigan State | 5-0 | 852 |
| 12 | Oklahoma State | 5-0 | 749 |
| 13 | Arkansas | 4-1 | 745 |
| 14 | Notre Dame | 4-1 | 701 |
| 15 | Coastal Carolina | 5-0 | 694 |
| 16 | Kentucky | 5-0 | 662 |
| 17 | Ole Miss | 3-1 | 601 |
| 18 | Auburn | 4-1 | 448 |
| 19 | Wake Forest | 5-0 | 412 |
| 20 | Florida | 3-2 | 343 |
| 21 | Texas | 4-1 | 303 |
| 22 | Arizona State | 4-1 | 297 |
| 23 | NC State | 4-1 | 279 |
| 24 | SMU | 5-0 | 136 |
| 25 | San Diego State | 4-0 | 111 |
That #3 ranking ties the Ferentz-era record for highest ranking; Iowa previously made it to #3 in the rankings in the 2002 and 2015 seasons under Ferentz. This is the earliest in the season that Iowa has been ranked #3 since the fabled 1985 season. Iowa began the season ranked #4 in the preseason rankings that year, reached #3 in the Week 4 rankings, and moved up to #1 in the Week 5 rankings, where they stayed until a Week 10 drop to #6 following a loss to Ohio State.
In 2015, Iowa hit #3 in the rankings in Week 12, after a 40-20 win over Purdue. They fell to #4 the following week (after a 28-20 win over Nebraska) and then fell to #6 after a narrow loss to Michigan State in the Big Ten Championship Game. In 2002, Iowa reached #3 in the rankings in Week 15, two weeks after they had concluded their regular season schedule. They stayed at #3 until losing to USC in the 2003 Rose Bowl.
And the new Coaches Poll:
| RANK | TEAM | RECORD | PTS |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Alabama (63) | 5-0 | 1623 |
| 2 | Georgia (2) | 5-0 | 1562 |
| 3 | Iowa | 5-0 | 1429 |
| 4 | Penn State | 5-0 | 1397 |
| 5 | Oklahoma | 5-0 | 1380 |
| 6 | Cincinnati | 5-0 | 1358 |
| 7 | Ohio State | 4-1 | 1172 |
| 8 | Michigan | 5-0 | 1125 |
| 9 | Oregon | 4-1 | 1000 |
| 10 | BYU | 5-0 | 968 |
| 11 | Michigan State | 5-0 | 911 |
| 12 | Oklahoma State | 5-0 | 798 |
| 13 | Notre Dame | 4-1 | 777 |
| 14 | Kentucky | 5-0 | 758 |
| 15 | Coastal Carolina | 5-0 | 699 |
| 16 | Arkansas | 4-1 | 652 |
| 17 | Ole Miss | 3-1 | 629 |
| 18 | Florida | 3-2 | 464 |
| 19 | Auburn | 4-1 | 463 |
| 20 | Wake Forest | 5-0 | 441 |
| 21 | Clemson | 3-2 | 288 |
| 22 | NC State | 4-1 | 257 |
| 23 | Texas | 4-1 | 256 |
| 24 | SMU | 5-0 | 142 |
| 25 | Arizona State | 4-1 | 141 |
Iowa and Penn State both moved up two spots in the Coaches Poll rankings this week, courtesy of Oregon's upset loss and another narrow Oklahoma victory. This week's reminder that the Coaches Poll is fundamentally a dumb and irrelevant poll is provided by the fact that at least one ballot still has Iowa at #18, while another ballot (or maybe the same one; who knows!) has Penn State at #20. Michigan and Michigan State are also both unranked on at least one Coaches Poll. Whoever is filling out those ballots is quite clearly Not Paying Attention to college football this year.
Iowa is the highest-ranked Big Ten team in both polls (and in many sets of rankings; see below), which is certainly a heady place to be. The Big Ten as a whole is very well-represented in the rankings; there are five B1G squads in the top eleven in both polls; after Iowa at #3, there's Penn State at #4, Ohio State at #7, Michigan at #9/8, and Michigan State at #11. The Big Ten also looks a bit top-heavy, though -- there are no other B1G teams ranked by the polls and only one (Maryland) is still receiving votes.
Four of those five ranked Big Ten teams are also in the Big Ten East (all but Iowa). That sets up a bit of a good news/bad news scenario for Iowa. The good news is that the difficulty of the schedule projects to ease up over the back half of Iowa's schedule; the bad news is that they're not going to have many opportunities to record signature, resume-building victories over those six games and their strength of schedule rating will likely take a hit. In fact, barring something unexpected, it's likely that Iowa won't face another ranked opponent in the regular season after #4 Penn State on Saturday. (If Nebraska went on a torrid run from now until Black Friday, they could probably squeeze into the rankings... but they also have games coming up against Michigan and Ohio State, so.)
These rankings set up a #3 vs #4 meeting between Iowa and Penn State, which is a truly epic showdown. It's also a very rare thing: a Top 5 Big Ten throwdown that doesn't feature Ohio State or Michigan. That hasn't happened for a very, very, very long time.
When No. 3 Iowa plays No. 4 Penn State this week, it will be first matchup of top 5 Big Ten teams that doesn't include Ohio State or Michigan since No. 3 Wisconsin beat No. 5 Minnesota 14-0 on 11/24/62
— Josh Dubow (@JoshDubowAP) October 3, 2021
The hype for this game is going to be immense. We'll have a lot more to say about that over the next few days as we build up to Saturday and the super-showdown that awaits the Hawkeyes and Nittany Lions.
In other rankings/ratings updates, Iowa is #4 in the Sagarin ratings and #3 in the Massey Index. They're also #3 in the latest FWAA Super 16 rankings. Early October rankings still don't mean the most, but they're still a signpost of what teams matter the most at the moment -- and right now Iowa matters a whole hell of a lot in the college football world. And that is pretty awesome.
