College Football Non-Conference Power Rankings: Week 2

The NFL season is nicely underway and week 2 of the college season began yesterday with a conference tilt in the Big East. But I'm back to focus on the non conference games on tap this weekend. I posted the formula in last week's edition (link is below) but again the gist of the formula is that you get rewarded for playing major conference teams and/or on the road and punished for having cupcakes on your schedule.

For the rest of the season the rankings listed will be cumulative scores from every week of the season, so there will be a little variation but not wildly. In the event of ties (there are multiple again this week) the current week's score and the presence of cupcakes versus tough tests will be taken into account.

Click here for last week's rankings. In parentheses below for each conference, the first number is the score for this week's schedule and the second number is cumulative score for the season.

1. Big Ten (23; 34): A phenomenal showing topping any total from last week puts these guys at the top. Minnesota is the only team hosting an FCS school this weekend, and a majority of the conference is on the road. Kudos especially to Nebraska, Illinois, Penn State, and Wisconsin for heading out to face major foes (plus Purdue off to South Bend to play Notre Dame).
2. Conference-USA (13; 33): They stay pat at number 2, but took a step back with 2 teams (Marshall and SMU) hosting cupcakes. They do match the B1G's travel to tough opponents with 4 teams (East Carolina, UTEP, UCF and Rice, the latter two of whom have started with the best scores in this metric for a team so far along with a few others). Their score this week is also impacted by a conference game (Tulane-Tulsa) plus byes for Southern Miss and UAB.
3. Mid-American Conference: (11, 33): C-USA got the nod because 5 MAC teams are hosting cupcakes this week (NIU, Buffalo, Eastern and Western Michigan, and Miami-Ohio). Ball State and Kent State are off to play big boys, and Central Michigan is hosting Michigan State to help offset that. Could be better as a whole, but a decent week for these guys as opposed to an amazing one drops them to 3rd.
4. Mountain West Conference (10, 27): This week only 2 schools (UNLV and Colorado State) earn criticism while the Air Force, Fresno State and New Mexico hit the road for big time games. Their weekly score is roughly middle of the pack overall, so there's no shame in where they're at.
5. Pac-12 (16; 25): Overall these guys really stepped it up from last week. There are still 3 teams hosting I-AA squads (Cal, Washington State and Colorado) but with Washington and USC on the road facing tough opponents and teams like UCLA and both Arizona schools hosting quality opponents, it's almost a shame the Pac-12 didn't score higher.
6. SEC (9; 17): Conference tilts are already underway this week (3 games total) which didn't help their cause but the SEC still came away with a good showing overall. Tennessee is the only school that got penalized, while you see Vanderbilt going on the road and LSU hosting Washington.
7. Sun Belt (5; 13): One conference game took away a little potential here, but much of the conference isn't off to the slaughter this week, instead playing other mid major conference opponents. The exception is Western Kentucky, off to face Alabama.
8. Big XII (10; 12): The Big XII made up for a poor showing last week to jump up the rankings. Oklahoma is hosting a cupcake, and former mid major TCU isn't thrilling me with a season opener against a current mid major. However, Iowa State and Oklahoma State leaving the comforts of home to face other big schools helps offset this.
9. Big East (6; 11): This 3-way tie was fairly tough to break, especially considering I initially miscalculated one of the below conferences, but one school in each of them puts the Big East at the head of this group. Getting the Cincy win over Pitt out of the picture, you have Louisville and Rutgers, 2 schools that impressed last week hosting cupcakes, but tough opponents for UConn, South Florida, Temple and Syracuse (2 very tough opening games at home. Much respect.) give them an edge.
10. WAC: (7; 11): I originally had the WAC at 8 points for the week giving them 12 total before taking a closer look at the schedule. Utah State is hosting a tough Utah squad tonight, and most of the other schools are either home against big schools or on the road against other mid majors. San Jose State lost a point for an FCS team, and UTSA is playing D-II's Texas A&M-Commerce. It's the Lions' first ever game against an FBS team. I don't care if it's against a WAC team, you scheduled a D-II team that has won 4 games in the last 2-plus seasons and hasn't a season above .500 since at least 2007. Shame on you. I'm moving on to the last place conference before my rage breaks.
11. ACC (11; 11): They improved over a score of 0 last week, so that's something. But despite Maryland, NC State, Duke and Miami all off to face big opponents in their houses, we still have 4 teams hosting cupcakes in Boston College, Florida State, Georgia Tech and Virginia Tech. I'm especially ashamed of Florida State, the only school in the FBS with a negative score in my non conference scheduling metric because they've hosted 2 cupcakes.

As a random aside, I've included the independents in my study as well, and they have 6 total points through 2 weeks (3 each week). BYU is the only one to schedule a cupcake so far and Notre Dame has 3 of their 6 points to date. I'll have next week's rankings updated when I get a look at those schedules. Enjoy a full weekend of football! Hope your fantasy teams are doing well, and if you're picking teams, I hope you're off to a better start than Nathaniel and I am!