It's that time of the year once again to take a look at the coming season of college football, and that means a preseason poll. My second longest standing tradition here at Hear the Hurd is to provide a weekly top 25 poll for college football, and this year marks the fourth in a row to track the teams week by week. I claim no special knowledge of college football, nor do I feel the poll especially accurate, but it is fun for me to see the teams move up and down throughout the year, and once win/loss records become more important, I find the rankings more accurate. And of course, preseason polls are really almost worthless. The season itself is the only way to truly compare each team. But again, the attempt to try makes for an enjoyable exercise.
As usual, I have set to it by comparing the polls of various respected sports publications, namely Street and Smiths, Athlon, Sports Illustrated, CBS Sportsline, The Sporting News, CollegeFootballNews.com and of course, the old AP and Coaches poll. It's as scientific as the process will get. So let's take a look at the first ranking:
- Ohio State
- USC
- Texas
- Notre Dame
- Auburn
- Oklahoma
- Florida
- West Virginia
- LSU
- California
- Miami
- Florida State
- Louisville
- Michigan
- Clemson
- Georgia
- Virginia Tech
- Iowa
- Tennessee
- Nebraska
- TCU
- Arizona State
- Penn State
- Oregon
- Texas Tech
And Alabama was very close to breaking in as well, as were Utah and Georgia Tech. Tech will most certainly break the top 25 if they somehow beat Notre Dame in their first game. The Georgia Bulldogs will have an interesting time of it early in the season as they determine who will take over for D.J. Shockley with four promising possibilities. I hope, however, that it does not take them terribly long to decide as a constant rotation would seem an ill omen for the season. I suspect one of the young underclassmen will step up, hopefully by the Tennessee game on October 7th.
As for the other teams, there does not seem to be a consensus on any one team for number one which means that the field is wide open. That should make for a pretty fun autumn as several very talented teams fight it out for the top spot, with the top five all strong contenders and a full slate of hopefuls falling close behind. I'm certainly looking forward to it now more than ever as the lackluster baseball season (except for the Tigers) winds down.
Georgia's first game is September 2nd against Western Kentucky and the first real test follows a week later on the road at South Carolina. If they have any hope of being one of the teams in the middle of the fight, they will need to get through September unbeaten. Beat Tennessee, Florida, Auburn and Georgia Tech and things will be looking darn good come January. Lose to one of them and it could still be interesting. Lose two and it's most likely Capital One or worse when the bowls roll around.
Regardless, it should be a fun year. The full season gets started August 31st, and I am ready for it. Crisp weather is on the way and that means baseball playoffs, my anniversary here at the blog (my fourth) and glorious college football, especially Between the Hedges. An excellent time of year. That is all.
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