Folks, I’m not going to mince words on this. I just submitted this vote (on behalf of GridironHeroics) a few minutes ago to Craig Haley at STATS/PERFORM as part of the official FCS football poll ballot week six — and it was a toss-up in many ways.
On Monday morning? I’m going to develop more of a postseason/playoff picture (seeding and at-large projection, etc.) because there are trickier dynamics when it comes to the postseason picture. The FCS annually has eight top seeds who don’t have to play on Thanksgiving weekend.
They can go home and enjoy turkey with family and friends without worrying about a game in 48 hours. That comes in the next story, which you can find pinned to the top of my Twitter acct (@BrianMacWriter) by Monday evening.
This week’s ballot explanation is in the Week Six FCS Wrap which is linked below:
WEEK SIX FCS WRAP: How did this weekend affect the playoff picture?
FCS PODCAST – BMAC AND THE NACH – ON APPLE PODCASTS
FCS FOOTBALL POLL BALLOT EXPLANATION:
Want to know the reasoning for this week’s vote? It’s available at the link below!
WEEK SIX FCS WRAP: How did this weekend affect the playoff picture?
THE VOTE: (note that FCS REC (record vs. FCS) is what the playoff committee will look at — unless the FCS school has an FBS win or a lower-division loss).
| RK | WEEK SIX (OCT 9 VOTE) | REC | FCS REC | FBS WIN? | LAST WK | WEEK 6 RESULTS (Oct 8) |
| 1 | NDSU | 5-1 | 5-0 | 1 | BEAT Indiana State 31-26 (away) | |
| 2 | Weber State | 5-0 | 3-0+ | YES | 3 | BEAT East Wash 45-21 (home) |
| 3 | SDSU | 5-1 | 5-0 | 4 | BEAT South Dakota 28-3 (away) | |
| 4 | Montana | 5-0 | 5-0 | 2 | OPEN DATE | |
| 5 | Montana State | 5-1 | 5-0 | 5 | BEAT Idaho State 37-6 (home) | |
| 6 | Sac. State | 5-0 | 4-0+ | YES | 7 | BEAT Northern Colorado badly |
| 7 | Elon | 5-1 | 5-0 | 11 | BEAT Towson 27-10 | |
| 8 | SEMO | 5-1 | 5-0 | 8 | BEAT Tennessee Tech 34-20 | |
| 9 | Holy Cross | 6-0 | 5-0+ | YES | 9 | BEAT Bucknell 57-0 |
| 10 | William & Mary | 5-1 | 4-1& | YES | 21 | BEAT Delaware 27-21 |
| 11 | Delaware | 5-1 | 4-1+ | YES | 6 | LOST TO WILL & MARY 27-21 (road) |
| 12 | Incarnate Word | 5-1 | 4-1+ | YES | 12 | BEAT LAMAR 56-17 |
| 13 | Southern Illinois | 4-2 | 3-2+ | YES | 13 | BEAT MISSOURI STATE 38-21 |
| 14 | Chattanooga | 4-1 | 4-0 | 10 | OPEN DATE | |
| 15 | North Dakota | 4-2 | 4-1 | 14 | BEAT Youngstown 35-30 | |
| 16 | Austin Peay | 4-2 | 4-1 | 17 | OPEN DATE | |
| 17 | East. Kentucky | 3-2 | 2-1+ | YES | 19 | OPEN DATE |
| 18 | Mercer | 5-1 | 5-0 | 23 | BEAT Western Carolina 49-6 | |
| 19 | Samford | 5-1 | 5-0 | 24 | BEAT Wofford 28-14 | |
| 20 | Jackson St. | 5-0 | 5-0 | 21 | BEAT Alabama State 26-12 | |
| 21 | Idaho | 3-2 | 3-0 | 22 | OPEN DATE | |
| 22 | Furman | 4-2 | 3-1 | NR | BEAT The Citadel 21-10 | |
| 23 | Princeton | 4-0 | 4-0 | NR | BEAT Lafayette 23-2 | |
| 24 | New Hampshire | 4-2 | 4-1 | NR | BEAT Stony Brook 24-14 | |
| 25 | Fordham | 5-1 | 5-0 | 25 | BEAT Lehigh 40-28 |
A (+) indicates the team has beaten a Group of Five Conference FBS team, a (&) indicates the team has beaten a Power Five Conference FBS team.
Brian McLaughlin has been a voter on the STATS/PERFORM FCS football poll since 2016, while also voting on the postseason awards — the Walter Payton Award (top offensive player), the Buck Buchanan Award (top defensive player), the Jerry Rice Award (the top freshman in FCS football), and the Eddie Robinson Award (top coach that year).
Brian votes based on his ballot last year, not the final poll tally from the entire group. He believes this keeps his vote to comparing apples to apples and expressing his opinion on what he has seen. When there is a team listed above that doesn’t make it into the publically released FCS football poll, that indicates that no other voter listed the team and that eliminates that team from being even in the “also receiving votes” category.
Also, this year, if a program is ineligible for the postseason yet is playing in one of the playoff-bound conferences — that program isn’t allowed in the poll. But Ivy Leagues and HBCUs are included because they determine their champions in a different way.
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