Dear reader, five of the country's top 8 teams lost this week for the first time in the history of the AP Top 25 poll.

Let’s dive into the results of the wreckage.

My AP Top 25 poll after Week 7

1. BYU, 2. Ohio State, 3. Notre Dame, 4. Georgia, 5. Miami, 6. Ole Miss, 7. Indiana, 8. Texas Tech, 9. Tennessee, 10. Alabama, 11. Houston, 12. Arizona, 13. UCLA, 14. LSU, 15. Kentucky, 16. Mississippi State, 17. Utah, 18. Florida, 19. Texas, 20. Missouri, 21. Auburn, 22. Oklahoma State, 23. Oregon, 24. Wake Forest, 25. Northwestern

Just missed: Nebraska, Iowa, Boise State and Southern Cal

Newcomers: Tennessee, Florida and Auburn

Dropped from last week: Nebraska, Iowa and Boise State

A shocker at the top

I shocked myself on Saturday night by putting BYU at No. 1 in my poll, but I couldn’t find another team with a better case for the top spot. Somebody had to take the mantle after Georgia inexplicably lost to Auburn, and the Cougars’ win over Notre Dame was more than good enough to clear that bar.

A controversial ending, thanks to more suspect refereeing, took some of the spectacle out of the Cougars’ accomplishment, but it was still a signature win over a top-5-caliber team. Combine that with a strong win over Arizona — another top-15 team in my book — and an undefeated record, and BYU has a resume worthy of No. 1.

Even without star running back LJ Martin, BYU has no clear weakness, which makes this a top-5 team even before you look at the resume. The eye test (or style points, whatever you want to call it) matters when so many upsets and general chaos have muddied the waters of who’s good and who’s not on paper.

The rest of my top 5

Ohio State was my No. 2 team after beating Indiana on the road this week, despite losing quarterback Julian Sayin by the end of the game. The Buckeyes’ loss to Texas stopped them from being No. 1, but beating the Hoosiers and dominating everyone else they’ve played made coach Ryan Day’s team a worthy No. 2.

Notre Dame follows Ohio State after losing to BYU on the road. That loss alone wasn’t enough to drop the Irish — a case could be made that the referees robbed them of a comeback win in one of the toughest environments in the sport — but they haven’t beaten a ranked team, even if they’ve mostly dominated everyone else they’ve faced. They proved on Saturday that they’re a top 5 team; it just wasn’t enough to put them in the top 2.

Georgia dropped to No. 4 after its bizarre loss to Auburn. The performance was so out of character from what we saw in the first six weeks that I didn’t want to punish the Bulldogs too harshly — dominating everyone else and beating Alabama on the road is top 5 caliber stuff — but falling to Auburn in your own backyard has consequences, even if the Tigers are probably better than we thought they were heading into the week.

The last spot in my top 5 was a fight between Miami and Ole Miss.

The undefeated Hurricanes would’ve taken the spot easily (and maybe would’ve been even higher than No. 5) with another impressive performance over an unimpressive Florida State. But instead, the Seminoles took Miami to double overtime.

Ole Miss, on the flip side, dominated a Missouri team we might’ve all overrated heading into this week. They already have a win over LSU on the books; all that’s holding them back is a blowout loss to Florida and, in hindsight, a not-so-great close win over a three-loss Louisville.

I gave the nod to Miami in the end. I was tempted to punish the Hurricanes after this week’s lackluster showing, but they dominated their first five opponents — including ranked Wake Forest — and haven’t been pushed around the way Ole Miss was against Florida. The eye test also slightly favors Miami, in my opinion.

SEC chaos

I’ll admit it. I was too harsh on Tennessee last week by taking the Volunteers out of the poll after their extremely underwhelming win over Arkansas. In hindsight, I might’ve been too negative about their offense, which stepped up big time this week when the Volunteers upset Alabama.

Tennessee beating a top-10 team (Alabama) while suffering its only loss to Texas was enough to push the Volunteers all the way into my top 10. The eye test came in handy, since Tennessee’s win wasn’t a mere fluke. The Volunteers dominated Alabama in the second half and won fairly easily against a Crimson Tide team that has looked unstoppable this season — outside of the close Georgia loss.

As for Alabama, Saturday’s loss wasn’t enough to drop it out of the top-10. It was on the road against a quality team, and the Tide’s only other defeat came to a top-5 team in Georgia. Alabama has already demolished two top-20 teams, Mississippi State and Kentucky. This is still a top-10 team in this voter's eyes.

Meanwhile, figuring out what to do with Mississippi State, LSU, Kentucky, Florida, Texas, Missouri and even Auburn was much more complicated. Whichever way you slice it with these teams, you will create a contradiction.

Think Florida should be ahead of Texas after beating the Longhorns on the road? Well, the Gators also got blown out by Missouri and three-loss South Carolina. Does that mean Missouri definitely should be ahead of Florida? Well, Florida has two quality wins (Ole Miss and Texas) over Missouri’s one (Florida), and the Tigers were blown out by Ole Miss this week, 31-1, the same team that was crushed by Florida just a few weeks ago.

I can do this all day with these SEC teams. Ranking these middle-of-the-pack SEC teams properly is impossible, especially after Auburn pulled off the upset of the season over Georgia in Athens.

LSU was the first team in this sinister seven because the eye test is super strong — blowouts in all of its wins and stretches of quality play on both sides of the ball (look at how accurately Sam Leavitt is throwing it these days) — and the Tigers’ losses came by a combined nine points on the road to a pair of top-16 teams. Unlike Alabama this week, LSU didn’t get its rear handed to itself against Kentucky. The Tigers were the better team and only lost because they beat themselves.

Kentucky and Mississippi State were the next two teams (in that order) after the Wildcats won again on the road over Oklahoma and the Bulldogs fell a bit in the poll after I overrated them last week (it turns out beating Missouri at home is a good but not great win).

It’s hard to know what to do with Mississippi State with quarterback Kamario Taylor and running back Fluff Bothwell both being out. As for Kentucky, the Wildcats have a win over LSU, three road SEC victories and their only loss came to Alabama. The eye test doesn’t love them — they aren’t winning these games very convincingly — but the resume suggests they need to be ahead of more up-and-down teams like Texas and Florida.

Florida was next because the Gators beat Texas on the road and have that Ole Miss win in its pocket. I think the Longhorns’ victory over Ohio State trumps the latter accomplishment, but losing to Oklahoma is worse than losing to South Carolina (like Florida did) and, again, Florida won the head-to-head matchup.

Placing Missouri behind those two teams seems like malpractice since the Tigers blew out Florida. But after that win, Missouri doesn’t have much going for itself. Coach Eli Drinkwitz’s team lost to Mississippi State on the road, got blown out by Ole Miss, and has been frustratingly inconsistent on offense. I still placed the Tigers ahead of Auburn since they have one fewer loss and a nice win in their own right, but I don’t think Auburn is far behind.

Auburn has the much better win (Georgia), even if it lost to Florida and Tennessee and came a yard away from losing to Baylor. Outside of this weekend, Auburn’s offense has been fairly lifeless.

Other notes

SEC chaos cost Iowa and Boise State spots in the poll.

Iowa doesn’t have an impressive win and struggled to beat Iowa State and Michigan — two unspectacular teams — even if the Hawkeyes’ only loss came to Ohio State. Boise State’s only defeat came on the road to an Oregon team that was much healthier then than it is now, but the Broncos haven’t played a Power 4 conference team since then and struggled to beat Fresno State two weeks ago.

Iowa and Boise State don’t have bad resumes. I just can’t justify putting them in the poll over Auburn, Tennessee or Florida when all three teams have at least one win that dwarfs any victory Iowa or Boise State has.

Finally, Nebraska and Oregon battled for the last spot in my poll. Both teams slipped to the bottom of my rankings last week and met in Eugene late Saturday night.

Oregon won, despite probably playing the wrong quarterback for three quarters, and now has three wins over USC, Boise State and Nebraska — all of whom barely missed my rankings this week. Nebraska has lost to Indiana and Oregon by a combined six points, but the Huskers’ lack of quality wins is what kept them out of the poll.

Even if Northwestern — my No. 25 team — hasn’t beaten anyone great either, the Wildcats’ impressive ground game and dominant performances over Colorado and Penn State were enough for me to take them over Nebraska. Again, the eye test played a part here. Nebraska was my last team out.