Andres Chio/The Cougar

The American Athletic Conference had just one major matchup in an otherwise quiet week nine.

There was a shootout in Houston while most of the rest were close affairs.

Houston defeated No. 21 South Florida to keep its AAC undefeated record and gain a rank in the AP and Coaches Poll.

Navy fought its big rivalry game against No. 3 Notre Dame, but came out on the losing end.

Navy was no match for the college football playoff candidate, though it still managed to run for nearly 300 yards.

UConn continued to be one of the worst teams in FBS when it lost to independent UMass in a close game.

The Minutemen had not won an away game this season before it faced the Huskies. The Huskies sit near the bottom of every statistic category in the FBS.

Meanwhile, Tulane kept its dreams of winning the AAC West alive with a win over Tulsa, which has yet to win in conference.

Andres Chio/The Cougar

Tulane needs to win every game left in its season, beat Houston and have Houston lose one of its other three games for Tulane to take the West.

SMU took a step back when it lost to Cincinnati, but both are still in the running for the team’s respective divisions. SMU is in a similar spot where it needs to win every game, beat Houston and hope Houston loses to someone else for it to take the West.

The East is a much closer affair with three teams sitting with either zero or one loss. UCF is in the driver seat and has a critical matchup against Temple on Thursday.

The winner of that game will have complete control of the East and would be the favorite in the final quarter of the regular season.

Nearly every matchup in week 10 is a cross divisional one and if the West wins each one, Houston will have the West all but won.

sports@thedailycougar.com

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“AAC Update: West nearly locked in while East is a shootout” was originally posted on The Daily Cougar