No. 10: California Golden Bears
While Cal was relatively higher in last week's power rankings, the Golden Bears really have nothing to show for being an above-average football team on their schedule. Their best wins are against Minnesota and Boston College, which are not very impressive in the grand scheme of things. Not to mention that they got blasted by Duke on Saturday.
Cal needs to have some signature wins over competent teams until it can move further on up in these rankings. They have the talent to do so; it will all depend on whether they can assemble their team in time to secure more wins.
No. 9: North Carolina State Wolfpack
North Carolina State has been on a downward spiral lately and was on a two-game losing skid until defeating Campbell by 46 points this weekend. In the two weeks preceding that, they lost to Virginia Tech and were beaten by multiple scores by Duke.
The win that is keeping this program in a relatively high spot in the rankings is that they are the only team to have beaten Virginia so far this year, which is an impressive feat. The Wolfpack needs to get a grip on things soon, though, as their last two losses do not look good on their resume.
A win against Notre Dame next Saturday could change the outlook of the season for the Wolfpack if they are up to the challenge.