College football reporter catching heat for his ranking of Tennessee Vols in AP Top 25
A longtime college football reporter is catching some heat for his ranking of the Tennessee Vols in the latest AP Top 25 poll. The new AP Top 25 will be released later on Tuesday, but Action Network's Brett McMurphy, formerly of ESPN, revealed his top 25 on Twitter ahead of the release of the new […]
A longtime college football reporter is catching some heat for his ranking of the Tennessee Vols in the latest AP Top 25 poll.
The new AP Top 25 will be released later on Tuesday, but Action Network's Brett McMurphy, formerly of ESPN, revealed his top 25 on Twitter ahead of the release of the new poll.
McMurphy, who is an AP top 25 voter, has Tennessee at No. 14 in his post Week One rankings.
Having Tennessee at No. 14 definitely feels like a bit of an insult after the Vols won by 36 points against a Power-5 opponent (Virginia isn't that great, but Tennessee is only four years removed from losing games to Georgia State and BYU…no wins should ever be taken for granted).
What's worse than having Tennessee at No. 14 is the fact that McMurphy has LSU at No. 12.
Florida State destroyed LSU 45-24 on Sunday night in front of a national audience.
If the Tigers are the No. 12 team in the country based on what we saw in Week One, then there aren't many good teams across college football this season.
What's also odd is that McMurphy has FSU at No. 1, which indicates that he places a big importance on what happens in Week One as opposed to preseason rankings (even though I think we all know that the Seminoles probably won't be holding onto that No. 1 spot for long…all this is doing is giving Georgia some added motivation).
Keeping LSU ahead of Tennessee, however, shows that there's really no rhyme or reason to McMurphy's rankings.
(McMurphy also has Colorado at just No. 20 despite their big win against TCU.)
It's a bit early for rankings to matter. And really, the lower the Vols are ranked the better — Tennessee seems to play better with a chip on their shoulder — but it's still wild that this is how McMurphy views the Vols after a dominant season-opening win.
Butch Jones says Tennessee’s loss to Oklahoma in 2015 still ‘haunts’ him
Butch Jones says the Tennessee Vols’ loss to the Oklahoma Sooners in 2015 still ‘haunts’ him
Featured image via Christopher Hanewinckel-USA TODAY Sports
