ACC Power Rankings - Week 5

As more and more conference games get underway, the teams should be better to differentiate themselves (or muddy up the water).  Outside of the top 3 or 4, I can really envision most of these teams finishing within a couple of games of 0.500 as they each beat up on each other.  If there are any errors I apologize in advance.  The whistle had blown so I was unable to go back and review the ranking.

1. Florida State (1/3-0/8/8/13/7) – Watching State hang right with Clemson, I’m feeling more confident that the Noles are the best team in the league.
2. Clemson (2/3-0/3/4/47/67) – Clemson and/or the league officials survived Raleigh on Thursday. I don’t believe they are the number 3 team in the country and expect them to falter along the way.
3. Miami (3/3-0/15/15/52/14) – Miami is 3-0 and in the Top 15. Are the Canes back?
4. Georgia Tech (4/3-0/ORV/ORV/29/11) – Took care of NC and have a nice lead in their division.
5. Maryland (7/4-0/ORV/ORV/21/9) – I don’t like it, but it’s hard to argue against 4-0 with a Top 25 offense and defense.
6. NC State (6/2-1/NR/NR/51/42) – Lost a tough one, but showed a ton of potential on Thursday night. Man o man, what could have been had THAT call been made correctly. This ranking is based upon the Wolfpack team that played on Thursday night, not the one that hit the field against the Spiders.
7. Pitt (8/2-1/NR/NR/40/102) – Hung on to beat Duke in a rollercoaster game last weekend.
8. North Carolina (10/1-2/NR/NR/82/76) – The Red Bull Express is now 1-2 overall, and more importantly behind GT early in the conference race. Is NC a pretty good team playing a tough schedule? Hard to tell at this point in the season. Funny how the games get a bit tougher when your athletes at least have to pretend to attend class.
9. Virginia Tech (5/3-1/ORV/ORV/102/5) – 3 and 1 overall, but really struggling on offense four weeks into the season. Takes a huge drop in the Power Rankings based primarily on that offense. If they can get back on track, could easily rebound up the rankings.
10. Duke (9/2-2/NR/NR/57/52) – Lost to Pitt in a low scoring basketball game.
11. Syracuse (11/2-2/NR/NR/60/39) – 2-2 with really average overall team offense and defense numbers.
12. Boston College (12/2-1/NR/NR/114/66) – 2-1 coming off the bye week.
13. Virginia (13/2-1/NR/NR/87/33) – Took care of VMI to move their record to 2-1.
14. Wake Forest (14/2-2/NR/NR/107/28) – 2-2 and pretty lousy on the offensive side of the ball.

(Last Week/W-L/AP Poll/USA Today Coaches Poll/Total Offense/Total Defense)

Legend: ORV = Others Receiving Votes, NR = Not Ranked