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BYU Football: Yes, preseason polls matter and here’s why

By Adam Gibby

PROVO, UT - SEPTEMBER 14 : Gunner Romney #18 of the BYU Cougars is tackled by Talon Hufanga #15 and John Houston Jr. #10 of the USC Trojans during their game at LaVell Edwards Stadium on September 14, 2019 in Provo, Utah. (Photo by Chris Gardner/Getty Images)
PROVO, UT - SEPTEMBER 14 : Gunner Romney #18 of the BYU Cougars is tackled by Talon Hufanga #15 and John Houston Jr. #10 of the USC Trojans during their game at LaVell Edwards Stadium on September 14, 2019 in Provo, Utah. (Photo by Chris Gardner/Getty Images) /
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COLLEGE PARK, MD – OCTOBER 30: John Michael Schmitz #60 of the Minnesota Golden Gophers in position during a college football game against the Maryland Terrapins on October 30, 2020 at Capital One Field at Maryland Stadium in College Park, Maryland. (Photo by Mitchell Layton/Getty Images)
COLLEGE PARK, MD – OCTOBER 30: John Michael Schmitz #60 of the Minnesota Golden Gophers in position during a college football game against the Maryland Terrapins on October 30, 2020 at Capital One Field at Maryland Stadium in College Park, Maryland. (Photo by Mitchell Layton/Getty Images) /

Not so Bad Losses

In 2019 Minnesota was the surprise team of the year going from a bottom of the pack Big 10 team to a legitimate top ten team by the end of the regular season. However, at the start of the year, Minnesota defeated a bunch of teams that at the time for them appeared to be bad losses. After all, historically if you lose to Minnesota that is not a good sign for your team.

In fact, to show how disrespected the Gophers were in 2019, they weren’t ranked until week eight of the season and 7-0 overall. Luckily, none of teams that Minnesota beat through the first half of the season ended up being really good.

But what if someone had been good? What if the Gophers had played and beat a team in the mid to high twenties in the rankings? Their hopes of being a top 10 team would have been shot. Their loss to Minnesota would not have been viewed as losing to a team like Ohio State or Notre Dame, it would have been viewed like losing to Oregon State or Kansas State.

Bringing this back to BYU Football, we can look at the Cougars’ loss to Tulsa in 2008. At the time it appeared that the Cougars had just lost a terrible game and it derailed their ranking for the majority of the season. But guess what? The Golden Hurricanes finished 10-4 that year. Granted, losing to a CUSA team is never fun, but at the time it looked like losing to a 6-6 team based off what we knew from Tulsa in the past.

I truly believe that if rankings weren’t implemented until the middle of the season that BYU Football finishes in the top 10 in 2007 with their only two losses coming early in the season to UCLA and Tulsa as opposed to finishing 14th.

The issue is that we don’t know who is going to be the next Minnesota, UCF or Tulsa who seem to just appear out of nowhere. But again, just like in the last section, the damage is done. Nobody is going to look at BYU in week nine and say “Oh, well it turns out that Tulsa loss wasn’t so bad after all, let’s jump them up a few spots.”

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