Aggregation ...

• College Football Resource
• Associated Press ( + actual ballots)
• USA Today/Coaches
• Harris Poll
• Master Coaches Survey (Returns 9/16)
• BlogPoll
• Sagarin
• Computer ranking comparison
• Heisman Pundit
• Baseball Savant

Quickie Analysis

--- USC's feeling the heat, no?

--- "Resume ranking" is bogus.  If you're ranking by resume you shouldn't have USC in your top 25 at this point.  Having them in there is a cop-out and/or hybrid ranking.  Just as bad is ranking based on where you project a team to be record-wise at the end of the season.

--- Who in the world is putting Virginia Tech in their top 25?  Y'all have lost your minds.

--- Ranking the mid-level Pac-10 teams is a tricky affair at present.  We have a good idea that USC and UCLA and Cal are all top 25 teams, but the nature of the conference is such that teams are going to be bouncing around plenty before this thing's over.  Washington looks good now, but their defense is suspect.  Oregon State got trounced but fundamentally they're a good team if they can get any kind of quarterback play.  All is not what it seems for college football's most competitive conference.  Arizona will rise if they can get anything from that new offense.  Oregon always gets hot early but as we saw last year, can fall apart.  I like seeing where the pieces fall, but we just don't know much beyond the top three teams at present.

--- South Carolina is the SEC's version of a midlevel Pac-10 team.  It doesn't have the depth of talent to win consistently from week-to-week, but:

1)They are well coached

2)They have a winning offensive scheme and can play a little defense.  They're a little more defense-heavy than a Pac-10 team but midlevel Pac-10 teams are also a little more offense-heavy than South Carolina.  Two sides of the same coin in some ways though.

3)They are tough at home

Anyway, I think South Carolina gives the SEC a little Pac-10 feel with depth near the middle that can sneak up on people and actually win those ball games (unlike a Vanderbilt or Ole Miss or Mississippi State who can at best hope to play it close before inevitably falling).