Clemson cracks No. 1 in College Football Computer Composite

Clemson dropped 56 points on North Carolina State on Saturday, but two other results helped make the Tigers the clear No. 1 team in the College Football Computer Composite rankings this week.

Clemson has solely accounted for the single losses on both Notre Dame's and Appalachian State's records, and the former BCS computers like when teams beat good teams. As a result, the Tigers are No. 1 for the first time this week, supplanting LSU and earning the best geometric mean of any team in the CFCC since Ohio State in Week 5.

And Clemson's computer rank could be bolstered again this week, as it hosts the CFCC's No. 21 team, 7-1 Florida State, on Saturday.

LSU is No. 2 this week and visits the CFCC's No. 3 team, Alabama on Saturday night.

The College Football Computer Composite combines five of the computer formulas used in the former Bowl Championship Series standings to remove the human element from college football rankings. The computer rankings accounted for one-third of the final BCS rankings, with the Harris and Coaches polls comprising the other two-thirds.

The CFCC is compiled by taking the geometric mean of rankings formulated by Richard Billingsley, Wes Colley, Ken Massey, Jeff Sagarin and Peter Wolfe. Among the metrics feeding the CFCC are wins and losses, strength of schedule, home-field advantage, recency of game and, in Massey and Sagarin's case, margin of victory.

This week Clemson is No. 1 in Wolfe's rankings, No. 2 in in Colley, Massey and Sagarin's rankings, and No. 5 in Billingsley's ranking. It's possible, based on their bodies of work, that the winner of Notre Dame-Clemson from Oct. 3 would have been No. 1 this week either way. The Irish also have two wins against one-loss teams — Navy and most recently Temple.

Iowa State is the biggest riser in the CFCC this week, jumping 18 spots to No. 67 after shutting out Texas on Saturday (though the computers still have the Longhorns ahead of the Cyclones overall, at No. 59). The biggest decliner is Arizona State, which fell 14 spots after falling at home to Oregon in triple overtime last Thursday.

Updated CFCC rankings are published each week during the season on FootballFour.com. You can find every weekly ranking for 2015 here. This week's complete ranking of all 128 FBS teams is below.