Well that certainly lived up to the hype.

Just one day before the first BCS standings of the year are released, a day filled with interesting matchups and conference battles delivered drama and excitement around the country. At the end of the day, two top eight teams had fallen. But how close were we to having five fall on Saturday?

Let’s count the ways:

A game-saving tackle by Colt McCoy, a missed field goal, and a flubbed final five yards that fell incomplete, ended the game, and then didn’t, and then did.

Colt McCoy, Heisman candidate extraordinaire, was struggling. He was having one of his worst days as a Longhorn, and he was dragged down with a cold. He had also just witnessed the possible ending of friend Sam Bradford’s college career. And then he threw an interception.

As the only Longhorn DB Brian Jackson had to beat to score, McCoy looked helpless, but a great effort from the senior having a tough day stopped him from scoring, and likely saved the Longhorn’s chances of a national title, and the game ended 16-13 in Texas’s favor.

Alabama took Florida to the brink of defeat, playing right alongside Tim Tebow, his Gator offense and even their defense, driving the field multiple times. But missed field goals doomed the Razorbacks, and a late field goal from the Gators assured victory, 23-20.

And USC, seemingly cruising through Notre Dame again, instead found the Irish driving with a chance to score a tying touchdown, taking advantage of Trojan penalties all the way to the USC five-yard line. An incomplete pass from Jimmy Clausen seemed to end the Irish’s upset bid, but review put a second back on the clock, only for Clausen to throw an errant pass once again, sealing Trojan victory.

Ohio State and Virginia Tech weren’t so lucky, however, and will likely shake up what had been projected BCS standings until this point, but are now the real deal.

The Hokies were a projected No. 3, which certainly wont be the way it looks after they were unable to defeat ACC rival Georgia Tech, instead look for them to possibly fall all the way out of the top 12, with Georgia Tech making an appearance inside the first BCS top 12.

Boise State – who also survived an upset bid earlier this week – Texas and USC should all benefit from the Hokies sudden lack of energy from a team many considered the best one loss team in the nation.

Recently confirmed class of the Big East Cincinnati, Iowa and TCU should all benefit from the Buckeye’s shocking loss to Purdue.

The first official BCS standings are released tomorrow, but until then, here’s a quick stab at what the top 8 might look like without any polling info.

Projected BCS Standings October 18th

If you are looking for THIS WEEK’S projected BCS, please go to the Recap section of the Weekly Update Category, and click on the most recent article. Thanks!
One final week before the first BCS standings means just one final set of projected BCS standings, this week coming straight from the most reliable source for simulating the formula, the BCS Guru.

This time, Florida makes the huge jump to No. 1 that everyone had expected them to already hold at the beginning of the season. This jump was helped by their victory over LSU, whose came in at No. 2 on last week’s projected BCS, and also held the No. 1 spot in all available BCS computer rankings.

Alabama, likely on the strength of their inter conference rivalry game against Ole Miss, stays ahead Texas to claim the number two spot, and Virginia Tech, already considered the best one loss team in the nation, also stays ahead of the Longhorns at No. 3.

Texas does hold steady at No. 4, followed by Boise State, BCS-buster extraordinaire.

Two one-loss teams, USC and LSU come in at No. 6 and No. 7 respectively, as both still have a legitimate shot of making some noise late in the season if both are able to win out.

Three teams which will likely need a little help from the top follow the Tigers, Ohio State, Cincinnati and Iowa will probably need a fair few teams to lose ahead of them to make it into the national title picture.

TCU and Miami (FL) round out the top twelve of the projected BCS standings, and will need more than a little help from here on out.

Next week brings the arrival of the first real BCS standings, but without further ado, the current projected BCS standings, as provided by the BCS Guru, and available at BCS Know How, with a 94.166 percent confidence:

Parity.

It’s a great thing for a college football fan. On any given Saturday, anything can happen. Or at least that’s what ESPN wants you to think.

Evidentially, it looks like that’s exactly what we’ve got this season, as the top teams continue to fall, and fall hard to unranked and out of the blue opponents putting on clinics to beat the teams the “experts” had deemed worthy of top national rankings.

This weekend’s slate didn’t seem ripe for any major upsets, but after Thursday came and went with another one of the big upsets we’ve already come to expect from this season, the tone was set for even more on Saturday.

First to fall was #6 Cal. And fall they did to an Oregon team that had looked listless against Boise State just a few Thursdays ago. Then it was #5 Penn State, falling to Iowa as a top five team for the second straight season in a row, making it six top six teams to lose to unranked opponents on the season, approaching 2007-style numbers just four short weeks into the season and still three long weeks from the first BCS standings.

Speaking of, the projected BCS standings definitely took a hit this weekend, with four of the top eight teams losing, including Miami (FL) who lost to Virginia Tech in a match up of ranked teams. But this week will mark the first appearance of the Harris Poll, one-third of the final BCS calculation, bringing us ever closer to a fully-projectable BCS standings. Four of the six computers are also up and running, making us 89% of the way to a full BCS calculation.

Making major moves this week will be all the teams that lost, yes, but the losses leave four very open spots for new teams, which this week will likely include Virginia Tech, Oklahoma and (cue the BCS detractors) USC. Yes USC, who just two weekends ago lost to a very unranked Washington team would likely enter as #8 in a BCS standings if released this morning.

The Harris Poll was released for the first time this weekend, making BCS projecting a little easier, and results were surprising at best. The top three remained the same, as the Harris had little to say different than the Coaches’, but the shake up is strong after than. LSU, Virginia Tech and Boise State all move up, taking the vacated spots of Penn State, Ole Miss and Cal. Surprisingly, or not surprisingly depending on your rooting affiliation, one loss Oklahoma and USC both reenter the top 10 very soon after their respective losses.

The BCS is certainly shaping as we approach its October 18th release date, but in the intervening weeks, even more shake up is certainly a possibility.

-BCSKnowHow.com