2016 NCAA NCSS Rankings: Week 2

We're back with another look at the landscape of college football!

We're a week in, and some chaos has already happened as a result of some overall solid scheduling around the country. Week 2 will probably see a drop off in this to some degree, but there are still some good matchups on the docket.

So in each of the following weeks I will build on what I did earlier in the season. Today, that means taking the Week 1 rankings and adding to them based on the schedule. Each team will once again get a score between -1 and 3 based on the established criteria. Teams with a zero are either playing in conference or have a bye. The latter will be represented in purple.

So without further ado, here's our updated scores for Week 2. In parentheses are the average score for the week, then the cumulative season score, and finally, where each conference was ranked last week.

1. MAC (1.00, 2.25; LW: 2). Bowling Green, Kent State, Miami (Ohio), Toledo, and Western Michigan all face opponents from down a level, but Akron, Ohio, Ball State, Central Michigan, and Eastern Michigan all offset this with road trips to Power Five schools. 
2. Sun Belt (1.36, 2.18; LW: 5). Louisiana Lafayette gets dessert this week, but the rest of the conference makes up for it with the highest score of the week with road trips for Arkansas State, Idaho, Louisiana-Monroe, and Troy to Power conferences.
3. Mountain West (1.33, 2.17; LW: 4). Fresno State, Hawaii, and San Jose State all get their dessert in this week, while there's a bevy of Power Five road games, though San Diego State and Boise State host Pac-12 teams this week as well for some solid points.
4. Conference USA (1.15, 1.85; LW: 7). Charlotte, Louisiana Tech, North Texas, and Southern Mississippi all face FCS foes, but the entire rest of the conference is on the road, including Florida Atlantic, Middle Tennessee, Western Kentucky, and UTEP all facing teams from Power conferences.
5. SEC (0.36, 1.79; LW: 1). After a remarkably solid Week 1 schedule, the wheels fall off a little bit. A couple conference games bring this score down, but so do FCS games for Georgia, LSU, Ole Miss, and Texas A&M. Arkansas does help boost the score by traveling to TCU, and Tennessee hosting Virginia Tech helps offset those as well. 
6. Pac 12 (0.83, 1.75; LW: 3). Arizona State and Oregon host Power Five schools and Washington State and California are on the road this week to help boost the score. Arizona and Colorado do drag things down with FCS opponents though. 
7. Big Ten (0.86, 1.64; LW: 6). Rutgers, Minnesota, and Northwestern all get their D-IAA opponents out of the way this week, but the conference as a whole does well with Penn State visiting the ACC's Pittsburgh, Maryland going on the road, and Illinois and Iowa hosting other Power Five schools. 
8. Big 12 (1.20, 1.30; LW: 10). The conference gets a huge boost thanks to West Virginia being the only team with a lower level opponent on the slate. Iowa State and Texas Tech go on the road to face Power Conference opposition, while TCU hosts Arkansas. 
9. American Athletic (1.00, 1.17; LW: 8). Things get a little tougher here, though Temple, Houston, and Tulane have dessert as their second course. This is more than offset thanks to Cincinnati, UCF, SMU, and Tulsa all traveling to face Power Five opponents.  
10. ACC (0.93, 1.07; LW: 9). Clemson and Florida State celebrate big wins over Power Five opponents with dessert in Week 2, Georgia Tech also gets an FCS opponent, but it almost doesn't matter. North Carolina, Virginia, and Virginia Tech face other Power Five schools this week, while Boston College and NC State also hit the road and Pittsburgh hosts Penn State.  

To see the updated spreadsheet, click here.

After we had 46 FCS games last week, we only have 28 this time, so the negative scores are going down from here on out. The four independent schools are staying solid on this front, as their average 1.75 score for the week puts them cumulatively at 4.25 on average. They just don't get counted in these rankings because it's unfair.

Since I'll have a couple weeks' worth of data, I'll be back on Monday to wrap up the weekend's action and take a look at the Playoff Points rankings for the purpose of getting some numbers for the Death to the BCS Playoffs. I'll then be back a week from today to look at the Week 3 schedule.