So many upsets, so many candidates for the Bottom 10

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  Ryan McGeeOct 21, 2026, 07:00 AM ET

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  • Senior writer for ESPN The Magazine and ESPN.com
  • 2-time Sports Emmy winner
  • 2010, 2014 NMPA Writer of the Year

Inspirational thought of the week:

It seems we lose the game
Before we even start to play
Who made these rules?
We're so confused
Easily led astray
Let me tell ya that

Everything is everything
Everything is everything
Everything is everything
Everything
After winter
Must come spring
Everything is everything
Yo

-- "Everything is Everything," Lauryn Hill

Here at Bottom 10 Headquarters, located behind the scrap heap where they toss all of the old 0-for-5 "College GameDay" picks graphics before anyone can go back and check them, we keep thinking about the words that were sent forth out of Austin after the Horns got hooked for the second straight weekend.

No, not the words that filled my inbox and social media timelines after we had Texas in the Coveted Fifth Spot last week. Besides, those weren't so much words as they were a series of @#!%! and middle fingers raised between thumb and index "Hook 'Em" signs.

I'm speaking of the perturbed pronouncement from coach Steve Sarkisian when he was asked about the upcoming week and what would need to be evaluated. He said everything. When inquiries were made if that included his quarterback, he tersely told the room, "Everything is everything."

Also, anything is anything. And if we learned anything from Week 7 of college football, it's that anything goes. Because while the rest of the world was watching the top 10 cave in on itself like Lauryn Hill's accountant's hard drive, we here at the Bottom 10 were watching our hometown Charlotte 49ers orchestrate their own giant record-needle scratch musical masterpiece, "The Miseducation of Lincoln Financial Field."

With apologies to former Georgia running back Lauren Hargrove, former BYU quarterback Taysom Hill and Steve Harvey, here are the 2026 post-Week 7 Bottom 10 rankings.

1. Northern Ill-ugh-noise (0-6)

You know that when the Other Huskies made their move from the MAC to the Mountain West a big part of the pitch was, "Now we get to go to Hawai'i just as it's getting super cold!" Then imagine the meeting this week in Honolulu as the Warriors were preparing for the Pillow Fight of the Week. "Now we have to go to Illinois just as it's getting super cold?!"

2. ULM (pronounced "Uhlm") (0-6)

Ulm, speaking of Pillow Fights of the Week, ulm, we aren't all that, ulm, interested in this weekend's trip to Troy because, ulm, Southern Missed is coming to town on, ulm, Hulmaween!

3. UTEPid (1-6)

Speaking of not getting too far ahead of ourselves, have you noticed where the season ends for the Minors just before Thanksgiving? At Northern Illinois! The only time this game will be bigger is when it becomes a first-round game in the next wave of expansion of the College Football Playoff.

4. Kennesaw Mountain Landis State (1-5)

Continuing to speak of Pillow Fights of the Week, the Other Owls lost last week's edition, falling via a last-second field goal by then-ninth-ranked Mizzou State. Hey, remember when "last-second" actually meant the last second? Ah, the good old days. Amirite, Michigan and Notre Dame?

5. Polling

As Election Day nears, voters are being flogged with polls that will probably turn out to be totally wrong. For college football fans, that's already old hat. Week 7 turned the AP Top 25 into a Coveted Fifth Spot slot machine. I would say, "Go home, Top 25 voters, you're drunk!" but then again, I write the Bottom 10 every week using only one hand because I'm holding a bottle of amber liquid in the other.

6. Sackreminto State (1-5)

Sac State fell to 0-4 lifetime in #MACtion, a result that was supposed to set up a potential Pillow Fight of the Week of the Year, but we were denied a long list of Bottom 10 sentences that were likely to get me sent to HR when Ball State avoided said PFWOY by beating ...

7. Boiling Green (2-5)

The Brown Falcons were on the Bottom 10 Waiting List, but like me on the bench outside the Texas Roadhouse on a Saturday night, as soon as the buzzer went off, they came charging into the door and started stuffing their faces with rolls. Only their buzzer was a buzz kill, a Baller State 2-point conversion in OT.

8. Akronmonious (1-6)

This week's Undercard Pillow Fight of the Week will be when Akron zips over to Waiting Listers State of Kent. In related news, at my hotel last weekend I found a card under my pillow. Happy Birthday, Janine. I'm assuming that was you, Janine, who spilled red wine all over the comforter. I also left a card. A comment card. Zero stars. The Bottom 10 of housekeeping.

9. Minute Rice (1-6)

It's homecoming season, so it only feels rice, er, right to see these old friends returning to these rankings. That'll happen when you lose six straight. If they lose three more, we could be setting up a Pillow Fight of the Week of the Year of the Century on Nov. 19 when the Other Other Owls visit the Other Other Other Owls of ...

10. Temple of Doom (2-5)

Apologies to Temple alums Quinta Brunson and Kevin Negandhi, not to mention 2020 graduation speaker Lauryn Hill, but if you lose to the former Top Bottom 10 team at home and it snaps that Top Bottom 10 team's nation-leading 15-game losing streak and you think you shouldn't be ranked here, then in the words of another pair of Temple alums, I can't go for that, no-o-oh, no can do.

Waiting List: Mizzou State, Charlotte 1-and-6'ers, Baller State, Sam Houston We Have A Problem, Ol' The Minions, Southern Missed, Huh-Why-Yuh, Warshington State, replacing midlevel bowl games with first-round playoff games that look like midlevel bowl games.