the twelfth week of the 2025 college football season

published november 16, 2025

introductory comments

the tenth game (for most people anyway). three have gone 10-0, one has gone 0-10. you can tell from a team's record how they're doing, and that's why it was the first discriminator of team skill in my system until someone gave me the idea of the point system. so now everything's messed up. or not. as long as i get one sleeper team to do something cool the ap and coaches didn't notice, i'll be happy. here we go.

the top 25

  1. texas a&m - 261 pts. (10-0, +261)
  2. vanderbilt - 241 pts. (8-2, +161)
  3. oklahoma - 237 pts. (8-2, +135)
  4. usc - 209 pts. (8-2, +209)
  5. texas tech - 207 pts. (10-1, +334)
  6. utah - 204 pts. (8-2, +255)
  7. south florida - 196 pts. (7-3, +157)
  8. georgia - 193 pts. (9-1, +148)
  9. indiana - 192 pts. (11-0, +348)
  10. washington - 188 pts. (7-3, +150)
  11. ole miss - 183 pts. (10-1, +187)
  12. miami - 182 pts. (8-2, +195)
  13. ohio state - 181 pts. (10-0, +300)
  14. virginia - 179 pts. (9-2, +138)
  15. houston - 178 pts. (8-2, +74)
  16. iowa - 173 pts. (6-4, +138)
  17. old dominion - 171 pts. (7-3, +109)
  18. new mexico - 171 pts. (7-3, +42)
  19. oregon - 164 pts. (9-1, +253)
  20. san diego state - 161 pts. (8-2, +129)
  21. tennessee - 161 pts. (7-3, +145)
  22. missouri - 159 pts. (7-3, +150)
  23. texas - 156 pts. (7-3, +93)
  24. western michigan - 156 pts. (6-4, +34)
  25. pittsburgh - 155 pts. (7-3, +139)

the bottom 25

  1. middle tennessee - -119 pts. (1-9, -123)
  2. liberty - -118 pts. (4-6, +1)
  3. umass - -111 pts. (0-10, -271)
  4. army - -79 pts. (5-4, +3)
  5. south alabama - -53 pts. (3-7, -31)
  6. texas state - -51 pts. (4-6, +26)
  7. colorado state - -49 pts. (2-8, -99)
  8. san jose state - -47 pts. (3-7, -84)
  9. toledo - -42 pts. (6-4, +186)
  10. appalachian state - -41 pts. (4-6, -55)
  11. penn state - -37 pts. (4-6, +93)
  12. oregon state - -34 pts. (2-9, -111)
  13. boston college - -22 pts. (1-10, -110)
  14. louisiana - -19 pts. (4-6, -42)
  15. boise state - -17 pts. (6-4, +63)
  16. colorado - -6 pts. (3-7, -80)
  17. akron - 0 pts. (4-7, -51)
  18. new mexico state - 2 pts. (3-7, -68)
  19. northern illinois - 2 pts. (3-7, -67)
  20. eastern michigan - 4 pts. (4-7, -58)
  21. georgia state - 8 pts. (1-9, -188)
  22. buffalo - 8 pts. (5-5, +28)
  23. rice - 12 pts. (5-5, -68)
  24. clemson - 13 pts. (5-5, +50)
  25. bowling green - 15 pts. (3-7, -73)

adjustments

so when the espn crew shows up you're supposed to do good: notre dame @ pittsburgh

i have watched from afar as notre dame has spent this entire season trying to live down opening losses to miami and texas a&m. and yes, i did expect them to win this game. unfortunately for pittsburgh, the only part of gameday i saw this week was their student kicker challenge, which went very poorly for pittsburgh. then they lost by 22 to notre dame, so let's call that two atrocious shanks times 22 points is 44 docked from your total. no complaining, you still made the top list and even landed on a lucky score.

notre dame +2, pittsburgh -41

the horned frogs have been sufficiently "gigged": tcu @ byu

alright tcu. i gave you a spot and you decided you didn't want it. i see. you want to lose by 31 to byu and make this system look foolish, i'll take 31 points from your tally and drop you out the bottom of the list. have fun with your big twelve.

byu +13, tcu -39

the three amigos but by amigos i mean teams that should have won way more this week: south carolina @ texas a&m, florida @ ole miss, and georgia tech @ boston college

so here we have three teams who are very good in their conference playing teams that are really bad in their conference and miserably failing to beat the spread and even almost losing. this is exactly what the moral loss was meant for, and clearly these three teams didn't get the memo. georgia tech is the only one with the excuse of an away game. the others have some explaining to do after this week. -4 to each team, the math is left as an exercise to the reader.

further notes

bringing mockery upon what was once a great name: oregon state @ tulsa

if i told you before the big conference realignment that in 2025, the number one pac-12 team would lose consecutive games to sam houston and tulsa, i hope you wouldn't have believed me. tulsa very technically got their second power four win while still being winless in conference play in this game. this isn't looking good for your conference rematch or your conference as a whole, oregon state. and, well, you know what they say. if i had a nickel for every time tulsa beat an orange state school this year...

that's not how you get invited to the conference championship: memphis @ east carolina

one sizable upset is acceptable in some cases. that is not what you did this year, memphis. the american has been looking for a team to send as their champion. champion in the original sense, meaning a representative of the best there is out of a group. barring another big collapse, whoever wins this conference gets one and only one chance with the twelve titans of the year to win otherwise unattainable glory. and with that third loss, you don't cut it. i would say bad luck, but we're not playing baseball over here.

bowl eligibility: qualification

it seems we are running out of teams to qualify. congratulations to:

bowl eligibility: elimination

maybe nobody left can qualify because they keep losing. for this week, those teams are:

scorigami recognition

if you want to top the list, you have to score big, and only a few teams could do that this week. congratulations to:

the belt

the belt awaits the big game. if interested, however, please refer to the louisville game to watch them prove they didn't deserve the belt.

finishing up

next week will end the regular season for connecticut and the entire season for akron. this will be the teams' last chance to prepare to face their ancient combat partners in rivalry week. see how they fare from tuesday to saturday, and come back here next sunday for the breakdown. till next time.