Despite the most dominating victory of the 2010-11 college football bowl season (a 40-12 shellacking of the Virginia Tech Hokies in the 2011 Orange Bowl), the Stanford Cardinal only moved up one spot to fourth place in the year's final Associated Press and Coaches Poll college football rankings. Wyndam Makowsky of the Stanford Daily reported this was expected, since it was unlikely they would jump the loser of the national championship.
↵The Cardinal displaced the Wisconsin Badgers, who narrowly lost the Rose Bowl to the TCU Horned Frogs. TCU moved up from third to second in the final poll and received a few first place votes on both ballots, although they couldn't supplant the first place Auburn Tigers, who beat the Oregon Ducks 22-19 to win the 2011 BCS National Championship game. Oregon fell to third place, so they are still the top Pac-10 team in the poll. In fact, only Oregon and Stanford remained in the top 25 for the conference, as the Arizona Wildcats dropped out after getting routed in the Alamo Bowl by the Oklahoma St. Cowboys. The Washington Huskies received only one vote (in the Coaches Poll) after thoroughly shutting down the Nebraska Cornhuskers offense in the Holiday Bowl.
To see the full rankings, click here.