04/19/24
August 02, 2012
The first college football Coaches Poll is out: Last season's runner-up LSU has edged out last season's champion Alabama (who received two more first-place votes than LSU) by four points and still-under-sanction USC (who received one more first-place vote than LSU) by fifteen.
Unsurprisingly, the SEC dominates the rankings, with three more teams in the top ten (#6 Georgia, #9 South Carolina and #10 Arkansas) and Florida and Auburn rounding out the list at #23 and #25, respectively.
The Big 12 sees Oklahoma jump from a 10-3 #15 season last year to #4 in the new poll, while defending Pac-10 champions Oregon return at #5. The biggest leap up is the ACC's Florida State, from a 9-4 #23 season last year to a preseason #7. Michigan leads the Big Ten at #8 (with the two participants in last season's inaugural Big Ten Championship Game, Wisconsin and Michigan State, at #12 and #13 respectively).
Huge drops include last season's #3 Big 12 champions Oklahoma State to #19, #7 Stanford to #18, and #6 Boise State to #22. All three lost high-powered quarterbacks to the NFL.
The smug geeks at Facebook thought they were on top of the world and their stock is tanking.
Arkansas has been through the wringer and the players' heads must still be spinning while adapting to all the events and changes, but the Hogs are nevertheless judged to be stable and competitive enough to land at #10.
Not a bad day in the Court of Selective Preference.