I'd agree that they got this way because other teams have lost allowing them to move up by default, but if you take a look at almost any objective rating system this year you will see Ole Miss in the Top 15 and usually the Top 10.

Examples include ESPN FPI, Warren Nolan NPI, Football Outsiders' F+ to name a few. These systems try to really pick apart games that have been played and go as far as analyzing each individual play to compute how good and complete a team is.

If you look at OM's results, sure they haven't played a top tier team yet but the results of who they have played have been pretty stellar as far as complete games and results go. And the competition is better than just beating up on 3 patsies. Granted it was last year, but the teams they have beaten were all bowl teams last year and projected to do well this year (looking doubtful for Vandy). In fact, Boise State may end up running the table and if it weren't for Ole Miss beating them, they'd likely steal one of the 4 playoff spots at the end of the year so we have them to thank for that.

Football Outsiders F+:

LINK

Rk Team Record F/+ Last Wk Change S&P+ Rk FEI Rk
1 Florida State 2-0 32.7% 1 0 270.4 1 0.307 2
2 Oregon 3-0 28.5% 2 0 254.4 3 0.314 1
3 Alabama 3-0 27.4% 3 0 263.4 2 0.231 8
4 Stanford 2-1 22.4% 5 1 242.3 8 0.253 4
5 Oklahoma 3-0 22.0% 4 -1 244.9 4 0.226 10
6 Ole Miss 3-0 21.6% 16 10 242.1 9 0.235 7
7 Auburn 2-0 21.5% 7 0 244.2 5 0.218 12
8 Michigan State 1-1 20.8% 11 3 243.1 7 0.210 14
9 Texas A&M 3-0 20.8% 8 -1 240.7 10 0.224 11
10 LSU 3-0 20.2% 9 -1 235.1 14 0.247 5

Warren Nolan NPI:

LINK

Records include games against Division I opponents only.
Record Nolan Power Index Strength of Schedule Polls
Team W L Win Pct Rank NPI Rank SOS Rank AP Coaches
Auburn 3 0 1.0000 1 122.33 1 0.9167 2 5 5
Oklahoma 3 0 1.0000 1 122.06 2 0.7778 18 4 4
Ole Miss 3 0 1.0000 1 117.98 3 0.6296 48 10 12
Pittsburgh 3 0 1.0000 1 116.13 4 0.7593 19 33 43
Mississippi State 3 0 1.0000 1 115.94 5 0.7222 25 27 27
UCLA 3 0 1.0000 1 113.91 6 0.8148 11 12 10
BYU 3 0 1.0000 1 112.43 7 0.5185 81 21 23
Alabama 3 0 1.0000 1 111.69 8 0.7037 31 3 2
Syracuse 2 0 1.0000 1 111.22 9 0.9444 1
Texas A&M 3 0 1.0000 1 110.94 10 0.7222 25 6 7

ESPN's FPI:

LINK

RK TEAM W-L PROJ W-L WIN OUT% CONF WIN% REM SOS RK FPI
1 Florida State, ACC 2-0 11.1 - 1.6 15.1 61.9 38 25.6
2 Auburn, SEC 3-0 9.2 - 3.0 1.3 14.9 9 25.2
3 Alabama, SEC 3-0 9.4 - 2.9 2.1 16.3 2 25.0
4 Oregon, Pac-12 3-0 10.8 - 2.0 9.4 56.1 18 25.0
5 Texas A&M, SEC 3-0 9.5 - 2.7 2.1 15.8 14 24.9
6 Oklahoma, Big 12 3-0 10.5 - 1.5 18.5 53.6 41 24.4
7 Baylor, Big 12 3-0 10.1 - 1.9 9.1 33.7 42 22.5
8 Ole Miss, SEC 3-0 9.1 - 3.1 1.1 11.3 11 22.5
9 Georgia, SEC 1-1 9.0 - 3.3 3.2 12.4 52 21.8
10 LSU, SEC 3-0 7.9 - 4.1 0.1 3.0 3 19.3

This post was edited on 9/19/14 at 12:37 pm