Poll position and the late start

S

Section136

Well-Known Member
Here is something that I do not think has been brought up yet.

Lets say Iowa plays a fantastic game and dominates Arizona and wins by a score of something like 31-10.

How many of the poll voters will actually be awake to see it? The game starts at 10:30 on the east coast and will go until almost 2 AM out there. I fear that if we win convincingly on the road against a ranked team we will not move up in the rankings at all because of this situation.

Thoughts?
 
Section136 said:
Here is something that I do not think has been brought up yet.

Lets say Iowa plays a fantastic game and dominates Arizona and wins by a score of something like 31-10.

How many of the poll voters will actually be awake to see it? The game starts at 10:30 on the east coast and will go until almost 2 AM out there. I fear that if we win convincingly on the road against a ranked team we will not move up in the rankings at all because of this situation.

Thoughts?
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The voters out west will obviously see it. If we beat a ranked team by a score like that, we will move up, even if all they do is look at the score. But if it's the dogfight I expect it to be, and we win by 17 points or less, we might not move up without somebody else losing.
 
With both teams ranked the voters will know. If the game is put away early the east coast voters may not see the end but they'll have what they need to vote. If it's close those who vote will see it.
 
hwkwyld said:
With both teams ranked the voters will know. If the game is put away early the east coast voters may not see the end but they'll have what they need to vote. If it's close those who vote will see it.
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The biggest thing that could hurt us is if we jump out to a big lead and seem to have put it away early, so voters out east go to bed. Then we proceed to almost blow the lead and win by a TD or less. That could change the minds of a lot of pollsters if they went to bed early.
 
Section136 said:
Here is something that I do not think has been brought up yet.

Lets say Iowa plays a fantastic game and dominates Arizona and wins by a score of something like 31-10.

How many of the poll voters will actually be awake to see it? The game starts at 10:30 on the east coast and will go until almost 2 AM out there. I fear that if we win convincingly on the road against a ranked team we will not move up in the rankings at all because of this situation.

Thoughts?
Click to expand...


If you beat a ranked team that badly or a historically good team that is currently down some (PSU, MI) by a similar score, the polls will take care of themselves. If AZ wasn't ranked and the Hawks beat them 31-10, then yeah, people wouldn't notice near as much.

Keep in mind, I'm only refering to this happening because of the time difference, which I do think has an affect, though obviously not as much to and Oregon or USC.
 
Beating a ranked opponent on the road should boost the Hawks.
It's about who above us has a lackluster game, or who loses.
Even if most pollsters don't see the game, seeing the score will open their eyes (Or one would think).
Right now my top ten are

1. Alabama
2. Ohio St.
3. Boise St.
4. TCU
5. Oklahoma
6. Iowa
7. Texas
8. Oregon
9. Florida
10. Nebraska
 
I understand where you are coming from, but agree that it will not get overlooked simply because it is the only battle of top 25 teams. A win on the road will be enough in most voters eyes to at least hold, depending on what other teams do, so they will only need to see the boxscore. Last week was much worse in that the ISU game was the least national a national game could ever be. The small pocket on ABC combined with the 3 other huge name matchups that were going on at the same time, I would bet that not one voter actually watched the Iowa game last week.
 
They way I look at it is this....If we win whether it is close or not we can be sure that we will not drop in the rankings so we will at worst stay at 10th or 9th depending on the poll. We have Penn State, Wisconsin, Michigan, Michigan St, and Ohio State still to play so if we run the table we will be ranked no worse than #3 in the country. I personally think we would be ranked #2 or #1. Anyway, the point is it doesn't matter what we are ranked after the AZ game if we win and take care of business the rest of the way it will play out just fine for the Hawks.
 
A win probably doesn't move the Hawks at all this week. That is because the teams in front of them will probably not lose.

However, a win will probably allow them to keep their spot instead of dropping again this week. It might also help them hold their spot with the game against Ball State.

The only way they move up will be if they destroy Zona to the tune of 45 - 6 or something.

Just the way it goes.
 
CAARHawk said:
A win probably doesn't move the Hawks at all this week. That is because the teams in front of them will probably not lose.

However, a win will probably allow them to keep their spot instead of dropping again this week. It might also help them hold their spot with the game against Ball State.

The only way they move up will be if they destroy Zona to the tune of 45 - 6 or something.

Just the way it goes.
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False. Utterly false. Oklahoma almost got beaten by Utah State week 1 and then jumped us when they beat Florida State at home. I get bugged by the constant insistence that the only way to move up in the rankings is to have those in front of you lose games. VT has already sealed BSU's fate. They'll drop even if they do run the table. If we go on the road to a ranked opponent and win by 10+ we jump at least one spot, maybe more.
 
Hawkize1 said:
Beating a ranked opponent on the road should boost the Hawks.
It's about who above us has a lackluster game, or who loses.
Even if most pollsters don't see the game, seeing the score will open their eyes (Or one would think).
Right now my top ten are

1. Alabama
2. Ohio St.
3. Boise St.
4. TCU
5. Oklahoma
6. Iowa
7. Texas
8. Oregon
9. Florida
10. Nebraska
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There is no way Florida is better than Nebraska. Florida, IMO, should not be ranked inside the top 10.

They looked terribly sloppy in their first game of the year and needed an inexperienced quarterback at USF, throwing 4 interceptions, to allow them to keep the game close. If I remember correctly, two of their scores were defensive touchdowns last week.
 
Section136 said:
Here is something that I do not think has been brought up yet.

Lets say Iowa plays a fantastic game and dominates Arizona and wins by a score of something like 31-10.

How many of the poll voters will actually be awake to see it? The game starts at 10:30 on the east coast and will go until almost 2 AM out there. I fear that if we win convincingly on the road against a ranked team we will not move up in the rankings at all because of this situation.

Thoughts?
Click to expand...
I heard somewhere that sometimes pollsters have things like, I don't know, the internet, newspapers, ESPN, and sometimes when they get up in the morning they will take a look at what happened while they were sleeping. Just saying!
 
I don't like to play the "respect" card, but I think many voters would rank us higher if they thought we were "for real".

I would suspect beating a good team like Arizona, especially on the road, would give us a lot more credibility and make them see us in a very different light.
 
RADMAN said:
I heard somewhere that sometimes pollsters have things like, I don't know, the internet, newspapers, ESPN, and sometimes when they get up in the morning they will take a look at what happened while they were sleeping. Just saying!
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Hard to tell after we drop in the rankings when we dominate an in-state rival that is in a BCS conference. Just saying!
 
Look for an Iowa win of around 10-17 points depends on Stazi if he throws any out patterns, and again lets not worry about rankings that will take care of itself lets just beat AZ.
 
Iowa may have dropped from 9 to 10 in the rankings, but they actually increased in votes from 1027 to 1050.

Last week Iowa was 103 votes behind #6 Florida. Now they're 72 votes behind #6 Oregon.

So in terms of relative vote position, we're still moving up the charts.
 
Saginawbay said:
Look for an Iowa win of around 10-17 points depends on Stazi if he throws any out patterns, and again lets not worry about rankings that will take care of itself lets just beat AZ.
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He threw one against the clowns that could've been taken to the house. You could hear the collective groan from the crowd on the t.v. while the ball was in the air. Luckily an incomplete pass.
 
The OP is a good point. Hopefully, a solid win can still bolster them in the pollsters eyes. Many may just look at the outcome of the score. Hopefully a solid win will boost Iowa up the "coaches poll" which is prob the most inaccurate poll out there.

Seriously, if you lived on the E coast, the game would be starting at 11:30 p.m.?!! That's wild.
 
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