Last year, I unveiled my list of the Division I-A football teams in order of personal enthusiasm. This is a useful list of helping remember who I am rooting for in any given contest, and I also encourage those of you who don't ordinarily follow college football to use it in allocating your own level of support. (I also suggested in the comments that it could be viewed as "an intriguing meditation on the nature of human affiliation, identification, and self-construction," but that was probably just Bowl Season exuberance talking.)
Why are we seeing it again? Well, this is the 2013 update. Obviously, a list like this can not remain static. It will respond to public events and personal experiences vis-a-vis the universities involved. Any ranking according to subjective, multivariate criteria has a certain instability built into it. Furthermore, you the IAT readership are encouraged to lobby me to share your own football preference, and indeed this can work -- look how the University of Virginia has soared from 105th to 63rd in response to the advocacy of graduate PB!
Special dispensation will be granted to anyone who can figure out for me how I ended up with two teams in the #84 slot.
A very happy football season to you and yours.
The numbers following many team names refer to "Notes," below.
1. Oregon Ducks (1,2,5,6,8,10)
2. Oregon State Beavers (2,5,6,8,10)
3. Washington Huskies (2,5,6,9,10)
4. Old Dominion Monarchs (7,13) Having arbitrarily decided to like these guys, I'm finding it really works.
5. Stanford Cardinal (4,5,8,11)
6. Oklahoma Sooners (8,10,13)
7. Idaho Vandals (4,6,10,13)
8. California Golden Bears (4,5,6)
9. Utah Utes (4,5,6)
10. UCLA Bruins (5) (+6)
11. Massachusetts Minutemen (3)
12. Boise State Broncos (4,12)
13. USC Trojans (5,12)
14. Washington State Cougars (2,5)
15. Air Force Falcons (14)
16. Rutgers Scarlet Knights (15)
17. South Carolina Gamecocks (8,10)
18. Hawaiʻi (Rainbow) Warriors (4,8)
19. Notre Dame Fighting Irish (12)
20. Arizona Wildcats (5,15)
21. Auburn Tigers (7,12)
22. TCU Horned Frogs (8,9;1)
23. Colorado Buffaloes (5,6)
24. San Jose State Spartans (4)
25. SMU Mustangs (12)
26. Michigan Wolverines
27. Arkansas Razorbacks (6)
28. Army Black Knights (10,14)
29. Michigan State Spartans (10)
30. Arizona State Sun Devils (5)
31. Penn State Nittany Lions (12)
32. Boston College Eagles (6) rose on recent campus visit
33. San Diego State Aztecs (16)
34. Syracuse Orange(men) (8,9)
35. Fresno State Bulldogs (4)
36. UTEP Miners (10;1)
37. Wake Forest Demon Deacons (7,8)
38. Kansas State Wildcats (6,9,10)
39. Purdue Boilermakers (8)
40. Maryland Terrapins (8)
41. Navy Midshipmen (14)
42. Virginia Tech Hokies (10)
43. Oklahoma State Cowboys
44. Rice Owls (7,11;1)
45. Temple Owls (17)
46. Missouri Tigers (6)
47. Northwestern Wildcats (9)
48. New Mexico State Aggies (10)
49. Kansas Jayhawks (1)
50. Troy Trojans (7,13)
51. Arkansas State Red Wolves overrated on original list due to confusion with University of Arkansas
52. New Mexico Lobos
53. Tennessee Volunteers (9)
54. Iowa Hawkeyes
55. Ball State Cardinals (7)
56. Georgia Bulldogs (6)
57. North Texas Mean Green (8;1)
58. West Virginia Mountaineers
59. Utah State Aggies (4)
60. Baylor Bears (7,8*;1)
61. Connecticut Huskies (3)
62. East Carolina Pirates (7)
63. Virginia Cavaliers Rating soars on advocacy of reader PB.
64. Colorado State Rams
65. Kent State Golden Flashes (8)
66. Miami of Ohio RedHawks
67. Nevada Wolf Pack (10;2)
68. Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets (12)
69. Minnesota Golden Gophers
70. Ohio Bobcats
71. Alabama Crimson Tide (11) Have looked in heart to find underrated in initial listing
72. North Carolina State Wolfpack
73. Ole Miss Rebels (6)
74. Vanderbilt Commodores (7)
75. Wyoming Cowboys (10)
76. Duke Blue Devils (11)
77. Wisconsin Badgers (6)
78. Middle Tennessee Blue Raiders (18)
79. Western Kentucky Hilltoppers (18)
80. Tulane Green Wave (8,11;1)
81. Clemson Tigers (7)
82. Pittsburgh Panthers
83. Akron Zips (4)
84. Bowling Green Falcons
84. Georgia State Panthers
85. Charlotte 49ers
86. Texas State Bobcats (1)
87. Buffalo Bulls
88. Iowa State Cyclones
89. Kentucky Wildcats
90. UTSA Roadrunners
91. Marshall Thundering Herd (8)
92. Eastern Michigan Eagles
93. Illinois Fighting Illini
94. Indiana Hoosiers
95. North Carolina Tar Heels
96. Tulsa Golden Hurricane (8)
97. Toledo Rockets
98. Cincinnati Bearcats
99. Texas Tech Red Raiders (1)
100. Mississippi State Bulldogs
101. Louisiana Tech Bulldogs (1)
102. Louisville Cardinals
103. Houston Cougars
104. Memphis Tigers
105. NIU Huskies
106. UAB Blazers
107. Western Michigan Broncos
108. Southern Miss Golden Eagles
109. Texas A&M Aggies (1)
110. Nebraska Cornhuskers (3,4,5)
111. Louisiana-Lafayette Ragin' Cajuns (1,4)
112. South Alabama Jaguars
113. Texas Longhorns (1,6)
114. South Florida Bulls (1)
115. Florida Atlantic Owls (1)
116. Ohio State Buckeyes (4,5) loses ground on off-season fiasco.
117. Louisiana-Monroe Warhawks (1)
118. FIU Golden Panthers (1)
119. Central Michigan Chippewas (3)
120. BYU Cougars
121. LSU Tigers (1,3,5)
122. Florida Gators (1,5)
123. UCF Knights (1)
124. Miami Hurricanes (1,5)
125. UNLV Rebels (2)
126. Florida State Seminoles (1,5,6)
Notes
(1) Alma Mater
(2) Team is from Oregon or Washington
(3) Team is from New England
(4) General Regional Bias
(5) Member of Pac-12 Conference
(6) Have had pleasant experiences at town or campus
(7) College has amusing name
(8) College has amusing mascot name
(9) Team has appealing purple and/or orange uniforms
(10) College is associated with one or more people I like
(11) College has especially strong academic reputation
(12) Impressed by long-standing or historical excellence of football program
(13) Have arbitrarily decided to be a fan of team
(14) Team represents a military academy
(15) Team is associated with Mrs.5000
(16) Amused by long-standing haplessness of football program
(17) Program is associated with awesome old Bill Cosby comedy routines
(18) College is playing at a level comically "out of its league"
(1) Team is from Florida, Louisiana, or Texas
(2) Team is from Nevada
(3) Have had unpleasant experiences at town or campus.
(4) College has mascot name which, although arguably amusing, gets on my nerves a little
(5) Annoyed by long-standing or historical excellence of football program
(6) Program is associated with annoying fan hand gestures
6 comments:
Oh man, a College Football post! I've been hanging out for one of these! In my personal opinion, there are not enough of these and there never have been.
What's the 8* on the Baylor Bears mean?
Owl: Yes, but what are we going to do if Bowling Green plays Georgia State???
lamanyana: That's an excellent question. "Bears," in and of itself, is obviously not a particularly amusing mascot name. However, I have a sort of amusing private nickname for the team. To quote from my Absurdly Complete Guide to the 2012 Bowl Season:
"Baylor is a fairly conservative Baptist University, and for more than a century did not allow dancing on campus. In 1996, when I was a graduate student in Kansas -- which is in the same athletic league as Baylor -- they lifted the prohibition. For the next several months, the Kansas student press snarkily referred to Baylor as the "Dancing Bears," and the name has kind of stuck with me, and I think it's cute. Also, Baylor is in a league with several teams that I dislike, so naturally I am often pleased when the Dancing Bears win."
I'm curious about the geography underlying your designation of the CMU Chippewas (#119) as being from Florida, Louisiana, or Texas.....
That said, I admire your thoroughness!
Your thoroughness ain't so bad itself, DrSchnell. You are correct: Central Michigan University is neither from Florida, Louisiana, nor Texas.
It's not gonna help 'em, though.
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