New Year’s Six bowl is Western Michigan’s to lose

Never underestimate conference play even if you are a ranked team. This weekend the two ranked teams in the Group of Five both lost when No. 22 Navy fell to South Florida, 52-45 and Boise State fell to Wyoming by two points when they gave up a safety late in the game.

Western Michigan will be the only ranked team when the polls come out on Sunday and they were lucky to be off this weekend. Boise State and Navy were not the only teams in the hunt for the automatic bid from the Group of Five to lose.

Toledo which had one loss and a late season matchup vs. a potentially undefeated Western Michigan team, but the Rockets loss to Eastern Michigan, who is now bowl eligible for the first time in 30 years.

The American keeps beating itself up with three teams in the tougher Western Division now have two losses overall and two have one lose in league play.

Navy and Tulsa are now the only American teams with just one lost in the Western Division and these two teams can break that tie when the two face each other on November 12 at Annapolis.

The rankings this week among the Group of Five teams are a lot more interesting and is shrinking with fewer and fewer undefeated and one loss teams.

Here is the pecking order for the rest of the way, also the actual College Football rankings come out this week.

1. Undefeated Western Michigan
2. One-loss San Diego State
3. One-loss Boise State
4. One-loss Western Michigan
5. Two-loss Navy
6. Two-loss Tulsa
7. Two-loss Wyoming
8. Two-loss South Florida
9. One-loss Troy