2024 MAC Football Power Rankings: Week 1

A wild week that was to open the season has caused a fissure in our MAC Football Power Rankings.

Welcome to the second week of our blog’s Power Rankings!

We’re at the early part of the season where we’ll have aberrational results that can force some funky evaluations, and it’s no different this week, as you’ll notice several ties in the standings.

It’s difficult to know what all our teams will look like until a bit further along, but for now, we try to rank the 13 programs based on their first week’s performance.

Without further ado: the new and (hopefully) improved rankings!

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13. UMass Minutemen (LW: 12, down 1)

• Unanimous #13

Saturday was one of the most important games in years for the Minutemen, and well, there’s no lipstick which can be put on this particular pig: they looked really bad from start to finish.

We knew going in UMass was going to be figuring some things out as they went along, but EMU thoroughly dominated the game despite going through their own suite of changes. It’s hard to be optimistic, but the good news is a loss like this early on is a character-building opportunity.

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t-11. Kent State Golden Flashes (LW: 13, up 2)

• High vote: 10 (twice)
• Low vote: 12 (twice)
• Average vote: 11

Kent State showed some moxie on the road against a Pitt football team that ebbed between utterly unbeatable and sleepwalking. The final score doesn’t reflect how evenly these teams played over most of the game, but the Flashes will have to be more careful with the ball moving forward if they want to be competitive. There was one Devin Kargman interception right before the end of the first half which clearly altered the course of the contest; one can’t help but to wonder what could have been.

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t-11. Akron Zips (LW: 10, down 1)

• High vote: 10 (once)
• Low vote: 12 (once)
• Average vote: 11

Much like their Anniversary Award rival, Akron also showed some impressive fight against an Ohio State squad which thoroughly outmatched them. The Zips took the Buckeyes to a 17-3 halftime margin and could well have had more points had one or two plays gone the other way. Ultimately, the Zips were too injured and exhausted to keep up with the superior OSU roster, but you have to admire their performance.

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10. Ball State Cardinals (LW: 11, up 1)

• High vote: 9 (once)
• Low vote: 12 (three)
• Average vote: 10.8

Ball State is not only the lone team who did not play last week, but they’re also the only team to not have at least one game on the docket so far in 2024. They play Missouri State this week, so we won’t really know what this team looks like for awhile.

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9. Buffalo Bulls (LW: 9)

• High vote: 8 (once)
• Low vote: 10 (once)
• Average vote: 9

The Bulls started off the Pete Lembo era right with a win over Patriot League champion Lafayette, something which is certainly not taken for granted in Buffalo considering the last three years. They looked really good doing it too, with CJ Ognonna shining in his debut as the full-time staring quarterback, with 195 passing yards and two touchdowns along with 20 rushing yards and Jacquez Barksdale one rushing yard short of a century. They’ll take on Missouri this week.

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8. Eastern Michigan Eagles (LW: 8)

• High vote: 7 (once)
• Low vote: 9 (once)
• Average vote: 8

As discussed earlier, Eastern Michigan disposed of UMass pretty early, walking the Minutemen around like a dog in a park for much of the 60-minute contest. They did so mostly in part with an efficient offense (five scoring drives out of nine total), while also stymieing UMass on defense, killing all three of their five-plus minute drives and forcing a turnover-on-downs on an early eight-play drive. It’s a sterling effort— if an ugly one.

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7. Central Michigan Chippewas (LW: 7)

• High vote: 5 (once)
• Low vote: 7 (four)
• Average vote: 6.5

CMU went over, under, to the left of, to the right of and directly through the Blue Devils of Central Connecticut State in their Thursday night opener. The Chips were a fumble return touchdown away from “scoring the cycle”, posting 66 points (their highest output since 1975) and limiting CCSU to just one touchdown on the night.

It was a nice effort, considering they were without four starters on offense alone due to injury. We’ll know more about them in the next few weeks.

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6. Western Michigan Broncos (LW: 6)

• High vote: 4 (two)
• Low vote: 8 (three)
• Average vote: 5.3

WMU put up a helluva performance against the Wisconsin Badgers, taking the Big Ten team from Madison all four quarters in a nationally-televised game. We more or less expected WMU to be a potential growth candidate in 2024, and had some optimism they’d provide a great matchup with Wisconsin, but how close it was was particularly interesting even in a loss. If you’re a Broncos fan, there’s a lot to like. They now face Ohio State, who has shown themselves to be vulnerable if you hit them right.

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t-4. Northern Illinois Huskies (LW: 5, up 1)

• High vote: 4 (twice)
• Low vote: 6 (twice)
• Average vote: 5.16

NIU blew WIU out of the water in a contest that was never close from the opening kickoff, and now they have their most anticipated game of the year to look forward to. The on-the-ground emotions are high in DeKalb, given their history of playing Autonomous teams close, and seeing their offense at high gear last week will certainly accelerate thoughts of an upset. We’re going to be learning a lot about the defense this week, however, as the Leathernecks aren’t a good barometer for that sort of thing.

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t-4. Ohio Bobcats (LW: 4)

• High vote: 4 (three)
• Low vote: 7 (once)
• Average vote: 5.16

Ohio looked punchy in a loss to Syracuse on Saturday. They never looked particularly overwhelmed, even when the game started turning sour in the second half. The Bobbies are introducing a lot of new faces this year in what looks like a “reload” season, with Northwestern transfer Anthony Tyus III especially looking fantastic with 2-3 yards and two touchdowns in his Ohio debut. It was an electric performance that was not rewarded as such. Luckily for Ohio, they’ll have more chances to show off, with South Alabama under a first-year head coach next on the schedule.

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t-2. Bowling Green Falcons (LW: 3, up 1)

• High vote: 1 (once)
• Low vote: 3 (twice)
• Average vote: 2.16

BGSU took care of business against Fordham on Thursday to kick off the MAC football season, and they did so in high fashion, with a kickoff return touchdown for their first points of the night. They looked every part the offensive powerhouse in the effort, leaning on their rushing game to win the day in a game where they clearly outmatched their competition. It gets a bit harder from here, obviously, but they showed at least one of our voters enough to be voted the best team in the conference.

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t-2. Toledo Rockets (LW: 2)

• High vote: 1 (twice)
• Low vote: 3 (three)
• Average vote: 2.16

Toledo is another MAC team that played an FCS team early in the calendar, handily dispensing with the Duqense Dukes by a final of 49-10. There were no major issues in the victory, with both sides of the ball humming along like we expected them to do. They get another easy assignment this week with UMass on the docket and a real chance at going undefeated in out-of-conference games if they can get through Mississippi State on the road in Week 3.

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1. Miami RedHawks (LW: 1)

• High vote: 1 (three)
• Low vote: 3 (once)
• Average vote: 1.66

Miami had a tough— but winnable— assignment in Week 1, with Northwestern on the road at their temporary lakeside stadium. Unfortunately, their inability to progress the ball on offense, combined with conservative playcalling, really came back to haunt them late. The one play which ultimately proved fatal was the decision to kick the field goal from 26 yards out late in the fourth quarter after lining up as if to go for it. This was with under four minutes remaining, and put the game at 13-6 in favor of Northwestern. Miami never got the ball back after that.

This is the one concern with Miami moving forward; their stubborn— if admirable— commitment to old school philosophies. But those ideas did get them this far, so they’re unlikely to change any time soon.

They’re #1 for now, as they are the most talented team in the league as well as its defending champion, but they’re certainly no longer a unanimous choice.

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For transparency, here is our anonymous chart for this week. Did we get it right? Did we miss the mark? Let us know on Twitter or in the comments section!