2013 NCAA FBS Rankings: Week 5

We're onto Week 5 of the college football season, and we're definitely getting into the heart of conference play. With the number of byes from earlier on this season though, we're not into full-fledged conference play yet. But with the number of conference games going on this week, the weekly scores for conferences are going to be pretty small in general. On the plus side though, this means we're almost through all the cupcake scheduling.

If you want to see where we left off, you can view last week's rankings here. Like I've done so far this season, in parentheses you will see a pair of numbers: the first is the average score for the week of scheduling for a conference, and the second is for the conference's cumulative average over the course of the season. Here's where we stand with the upcoming weekend's games.

1. Conference USA (1.36, 6.57; LW: 1). East Carolina and UAB visit BCS teams to really boost their stock, but they're also aided by several other road trips or hosting of BCS teams in Tulsa and UTSA.
2. MAC (0.85, 5.54; LW: 2). A fairly slow week, but it's bolstered by trips by NIU, Miami-Ohio and Central Michigan.
3. Sun Belt (1.50, 5.50; LW: 4). There's a good jump here, with Troy, Arkansas State and South Alabama visiting big time schools.
4. American Athletic (1.30, 4.90; LW: 6). For having a handful of byes this week, they turned out well. SMU playing at TCU gave them the biggest boost, but South Florida and UCF host BCS teams, while Houston, UConn and Temple are also on the road.
5. Mountain West (0.50, 4.58; LW: 3). San Diego State and Wyoming are on the road at non-BCS teams, but other than that, there really isn't a lot to speak of this week.
6. Big Ten (0.17, 4.00; LW: 4). The B1G really only fell because of so many byes and conference games. The only reason they scored points is because Illinois and Purdue host MAC teams.
7. SEC (0.43, 3.43; LW: T-7). Most of the battles are staying in the Southeast, but there are some decent non-conference games, in particular South Carolina visiting UCF.
8. Pac-12 (0.00, 3.00; LW: T-7). As evidenced by the zero for the week, every game is a conference matchup.
9. ACC (0.43, 2.64, LW: 9). There's a lot of conference play and byes, with really the only big gain coming from Miami's trip to South Florida. No FCS teams in sight though.
10. Big 12 (0.60, 2.60; LW: 10). There are a ton of byes here too, with one conference matchup. TCU hosts SMU, and Oklahoma and Iowa State are on the road this week.

One thing I haven't noted yet (though it doesn't surprise me given likely contractual obligations) but Old Dominion, who started their schedule strong has played 3 straight FCS teams as an independent school. Like I already did with Georgia State (and I think the BCS did this too), Old Dominion is no longer eligible for the Death to the BCS Playoffs.

Tomorrow morning I'll have NFL picks for Week 4 from Nathaniel and I, and next week will probably be a fairly short post for the college ranks, given that a lot of teams are really kicking their conference slates into gear and it's still probably too early to think about playoff seedings. Maybe then I can start looking at playoff points though, but we'll see.