Unranked and Undaunted

Oregon State's Greg Laybourn celebrates with fans after beating top-ranked Southern California 27-21 on September 25 (AP Photo/Don Ryan, ESPN.com).

Forget March Madness. There’s plenty of madness going on this September and October in the world of college sports.

Just five weeks into the 2008 season of college football, we are beginning to sense an all-too-familiar pattern: overconfident BCS favorites running into overachieving opponents. The results are what sports fans excitedly refer to as upsets.

Enter unranked underdogs Oregon State, Ole Miss, and Michigan. Oregon State set the stage on Thursday night with their 27-21 shocker over top-ranked Southern California. Ole Miss followed suit by upsetting #4 Florida 31-30 in the Swamp, with a blocked extra-point attempt providing the winning margin. And it turns out Michigan can still win big games in the Big House, as the Wolverines stormed back from 19 down to upend #9 Wisconsin.

With a victory over #3 Georgia, eighth-ranked Alabama completed a weekend in which three of the top four teams fell from their positions of power. In fact, nine of the Top 25 teams lost last weekend, six of them falling to unranked opponents. When the dust settled, the Sooners of Oklahoma stood alone atop the college football world.

For now, at least.

The truth is, one-loss teams like USC, Florida, and Georgia still may have a legitimate chance of earning a berth in the BCS title game. Their schedules are, for the most part, strong enough down the stretch for experts to forget an early-season hiccup (especially if you’re a team like the Trojans, who seem to always get the benefit of the doubt from AP voters). Besides, there’s a LOT of football left to be played before January.

And if this year’s college football landscape proves to even remotely resemble that of last year, there are plenty of more upsets to come.

Here are my current top five Heisman candidates…

1) Sam Bradford (QB), Oklahoma. Last week, he did what fellow quarterbacks and Heisman hopefuls Mark Sanchez and Tim Tebow failed to do: win. Throwing for 411 yards and four touchdowns while steering your team into the #1 spot doesn’t hurt, either.

2) Chase Daniel (QB), Missouri. In a virtual tie with Bradford right now for Heisman favorite, Daniel is fourth in the country in passer rating. His numbers are impressive despite the fact that he routinely leaves the field early; the Tigers are winning games by an average margin of 33 points.

3) Javon Ringer (RB), Michigan State. The hard-nosed halfback has a nose for the endzone, as his 12 touchdowns are tops in the nation. Ringer’s true tests of grit will come against Big Ten frontrunners Penn State (#6 in AP Poll), Ohio State (#14), and Wisconsin (#18).

4) Colt McCoy (QB), Texas. Texas’ all-time leader in touchdown passes has completed exactly 80 % of his passes for 14 scores and just one interception. He’s also the Longhorns’ top rushing threat with nearly 300 yards and four scores on the ground.

5) Nate Davis (QB), Ball State. Okay, I admit I’m a bit biased on this one, but it’s hard to overlook the numbers. Davis is the ONLY quarterback in Division I to be ranked in the top 10 in rating, yards, completions, completion percentage, and yards per attempt. Take that, ESPN analysts.