Oklahoma gets jump in BCS

Published Oct. 19, 2010 2:11 p.m. ET

foxsports

Score an early round for Oklahoma.

And for computers.

The Sooners trail Oregon and Boise State in college football's human-driven polls. But they posted higher computer ratings virtually across the board and emerged Sunday atop the Bowl Championship Series' first computer ratings of the season.

Oregon came in at No. 2 and Boise No. 3, establishing an initial pecking order for berths in the BCS' Jan. 10 national championship game in Glendale, Ariz. The top two teams at the end of the regular season advance.

Don't discount Sunday's outcome. Ten times in the BCS' 12-year history at least one of the first-week top two wound up in the title game.

"We don't deserve to be No. 1," linebacker Travis Lewis said after Oklahoma's 52-0 rout of Iowa State on Saturday. "Put Boise State, Oregon or someone else up there. Let us work our way up."

Voters in the polls obliged. The Sooners are No. 3 in the USA TODAY Coaches Poll and No. 4 in the Harris Interactive Poll. But Oklahoma -- with wins vs. Florida State, Air Force and Texas -- sits atop four of the BCS-affiliated computer ratings.

Those ratings carry one-third weight and the polls two-thirds in the BCS mathematical rankings. The formula accounts for margins in each, however, and Oklahoma's computer dominance trumped the closer human voting.

Oregon and Boise State are 1-2 in both polls.

Boise's third-place BCS rank is the highest for a team from a non-marquee conference (in the Broncos' case, the Western Athletic). But their early positioning outside the top two, and TCU's at No. 5, underscores the help they'll need to crack the championship game lineup. Oklahoma and Oregon have built-in strength-of-schedule advantages that figure to pad their computer scores.