Top	2	5	10	15	20	25
Avg.	0.5	2.01	2.0	2.83	2.65	3.0
"="	1	2	3	3	5	6
OBO	1	1	3	4	4	4

 

 

Commentary: The before bowl games Rewards rankings matched the top two teams, but overall, like with the post bowl game rankings, there was more disagreement with the polls than in most years. Focusing only on the post bowl analysis, Rewards only ranked Oklahoma as #22 (instead of #11 as the polls did) because they had 3 losses and no "high quality wins" since their "best win" was over 9-4 Texas A&M (who also didn't have any such wins outside the Big-12 conference). Texas ended up as #19 in the final Rewards ranking, for similar reasons, while they were voted as the #13 team in both polls. Oregon State was ranked by Rewards as #15, aided by their victory over highly regarded USC, but they were only ranked as #21/#22 in the polls. Likewise with Tennessee: #17 in the final Rewards ranking, but only #25/#23 in the polls - which was probably a direct result (in the minds of the voters) of their bowl loss to Penn State . Undefeated Boise State also ended up #2 in the final Rewards ranking (#5/#6 in the polls) largely because of wins over Oklahoma (11-3) and Oregon State (10-4) , but they also defeated other bowl game winners too: Hawaii (11-3) , San Jose State (9-4), Utah (8-5), and Nevada (8-5, though they lost their bowl game).

Weekly Rewards ratings: 10/15, 10/22, 10/29, 11/5, 11/12, 11/19, 11/26, 12/3, Post Bowls