Give it up for NIU and Kent who are my favorites to make the MACC

http://www.ubbullrun.com/2012/10/27/3564...r-rankings

Rank Team +/- Comment
1 Northern Illinois 2 Chandler Who? With Ohio losing, Toledo struggling, and NIU demolishing Western Michigan it's hard not to put the Huskies as number one after this week
2 Kent 2 Ohio Who? Kent not only benefited form Ohio winning but they took out the number 15 team in the nation, on the road.
3 Toledo -2 Yes the weather was cruddy but if oyu have a guy run for 200 yards you should not be playing Buffalo as close as you did.
4 Ohio -2 This is going to be a bitter pill for the Bobcat faithful to swallow. They will lose their ranking, and behind Kent in the East, and it was at the hands of Miami!
5 Bowling Green 1 Congratulations on pasting Eastern Michigan and Getting Bowl eligible! It's fair to say Clawsons Job is safe for another season or two.
6 Ball State -1 Army Certainly gave the Cards all they could handle but with the win they hit six and will almost certainly be bowling.
7 Miami 1 They toughed out a game that they certainly could have lost, and put themselves on track for six, maybe seven wins.
8 Western Mighigan -1 Before they started to turn the Ball over they held Lynch in check and held the lead. Now they need to win out against Buffalo, CMU, and EMU to even qualify for a Bowl
9 Central Michigan 0 UMass and EMU give them a shot at five wins but it's hard to know if WMU or Miami will provide the sixth.
10 Eastern Michigan 0 Aside from the Army game EMU has not scored more than 16 since opening week.Next week they will face an angry Ohio.
11 Buffalo 1 Toledo did everything they could to keep Buffalo in the game but for some reason UB gave up on the run in the second half… psst That’s all you can do Buffalo
12 Akron -1 It's still ok to be high on Akron's future, but for now it seems they are crashing back to earth.
13 Umass 0 Hard draw for a first year FBS team to play anyone from the SEC, even Vandy. They still have 8-1 NIU on their schedule. After that they have there three worst opponents of the year

BGSU is likely to pass Ohio U on that list

NIU, UT, BSU, OU and Kent all look to be very legit teams very capable of bringing home some bowl victories this season! In terms of wins over BCS conferences, this has been the best year ever for the MAC and I can't ever recall conference rankings like CBS Sports having the MAC as the best non AQ conference week after week. (and of course this week's results and Kent's big OOC win only solidify that ranking whereas C-USA's only OOC game was ECU getting creamed by Navy).

Seems spot-on to me... in the big picture of conference respectability perspective I'll take a Kent win over #16 Rutgers and a #23 Ohio loss to Miami over the opposite (Ohio winning and a Kent loss).

Toledo seems to play to the level of their opponent all too much. They only beat EMU and Buffalo by 5 points each, yet take Arizona to OT and beat Cincinnati. Toledo is 8-1, but the biggest win was a 15 point win against CMU. You can't read into the scores and how Toledo played against teams like EMU, Buffalo and Coastal Carolina and think that means they can't beat teams like Cincinnati and Northern Illinois.

It's so hard to rank the top 3...NIU (blowout victories), Toledo (signature win) and Kent State (signature win) can all make claims to #1 in the MAC. Ohio (barely getting by in the MAC) is clearly #4.

The edge goes to NIU over Toledo since the game is in DeKalb. We'll have to see if Ohio can hold up their end of the bargain for a showdown with Kent State. But they might have trouble with BGSU and Ball State before then. If they trip up against the BGSU defense, the 11/17 Kent State at BGSU game becomes the semifinal for the East's representative in the MAC Championship game. And that's just a couple scenarios in the East.

And that is only if Kent does not get ahead of itself. We still need to beat our rival (God we better destroy them), our most played opponent in BGSU, and Miami before we even play Ohio. I see Kent favored but it is far too easy to screw up.

(10-28-2012 07:57 AM)BrianNowicki Wrote:  Toledo seems to play to the level of their opponent all too much. They only beat EMU and Buffalo by 5 points each, yet take Arizona to OT and beat Cincinnati. Toledo is 8-1, but the biggest win was a 15 point win against CMU. You can't read into the scores and how Toledo played against teams like EMU, Buffalo and Coastal Carolina and think that means they can't beat teams like Cincinnati and Northern Illinois.

I don't think there's anyone who thinks Toledo can't beat NIU.

I think NIU, Toledo and Kent State are very close. Hard for me to pull them apart.

Ohio and BGSU in the next tier down, and are also very close.

Think it's going to be a wild chase to the MACC.

Again I've seen them all and I still think NIU is the best. I don't think any teams have an answer for Jordan Lynch... With the awful weather conditions yesterday I don't think I saw Toledo at their best, but I don't think their defense is as good as NIU's or Kent's.

The way Toledo blew out MAC teams and played very tough OOC I thought there was no way NIU with the resume they had could beat us in the Glass Bowl last season... Just saying.

We've had good games: (WMU, BG, UC)
We've had bad games: (CCU, EMU, Buffalo)

NIU has had good games: (Buffalo, WMU, Ball State and more...)
NIU has had "not good" games: (Iowa, Army)

Toledo plays down to competition, while when the going gets tough NIU has a tendency to struggle a bit. If Toledo rises to the occasion, and NIU struggles vs. the best team on their schedule thus far... it's impossible to know the outcome. No doubt NIU will be favored at Huskie Stadium.]

I mean... our only loss was an OT loss to Arizona: who has beaten Oklahoma State, USC and Washington, and took Oregon State and Standford to OT.

I'm not ready to bump Ohio out of the top tier of teams for losing to their rival on the road. I also think NIU and Toledo looked much better against WMU because the Broncos were playing without Carder in those games. I know injuries are a part of the game but any team losing that good of a qb will lose games. Speaking of injuries, Buffalo had several starters back for the Toledo game. They probably knocked off the cobwebs this weekend plus their back-ups have gotten some game experience. If they haven't given up, they could be dangerous during the next few weeks.

That's also true. Oliver was back for Toledo. He was the reason for Buffalo's last TD.
UB scored on a Pick6, 42 yard pass to start a drive, and one manufactured drive with Oliver being the cause. UT's D played very good.

Toledo's offense has been slow except for Flu, but the second you doubt us we'll have a CMU/EMU type game.

(10-27-2012 10:54 PM)exCincy Kid Wrote:  NIU, UT, BSU, OU and Kent all look to be very legit teams very capable of bringing home some bowl victories this season! In terms of wins over BCS conferences, this has been the best year ever for the MAC and I can't ever recall conference rankings like CBS Sports having the MAC as the best non AQ conference week after week. (and of course this week's results and Kent's big OOC win only solidify that ranking whereas C-USA's only OOC game was ECU getting creamed by Navy).

Or the new normal....



The MAC has been on the rise the last 3-4 seasons with consistent top level play from NIU and Ohio plus a 4-1 record in the bowls last season.

CUSA has been challenged by increased recruiting competition and APR rules that make it difficult to go after some of the marginal student athletes they used to get to fill out the roster.

A MAC school is a great alternative if a player can't find a slot in the ACC or B1G because they can offer a residential campus setting and quality academic support.

I'm thoroughly enjoying this season. Both from an NIU point of view and a MAC point of view. Sticking it to the power conferences is great, I don't care which MAC team does it. Especially when you have fans from those conferences constantly denigrating the MAC, and ESPN pundits ignoring it. Or trying to ignore it. Only wish we'd gotten past Iowa.