College football rankings: 9 things to know about 2017’s preseason AP Poll

The first AP Top 25 of the college football season arrived last week, and another mile marker on the way to Week 1 is now in the rearview mirror.

Alabama’s No. 1 there and everywhere, with Ohio State, Florida State, USC, and Clemson rounding out AP voters’ top five. Here’s the full suite of preseason rankings:

(See explanations of all four rankings here.)

1. We should appreciate how cool it is that Bama’s No. 1 and FSU’s No. 3. Their clash on Sept. 2 (8 p.m. ET, ABC) is officially the highest-stakes opener ever, if we’re going just by their rankings. No preseason No. 1 in the AP era has ever opened against a team ranked better than fourth. That game is as blockbuster as blockbusters get.

2. Bama already had a record involving No. 1 appearances and just extended it.

3. S&P+ is an opponent-adjusted advanced stat developed by SB Nation’s Bill Connelly. Over the years, it’s had a good track record against Vegas point spreads. At this point, it’s the product of statistical projections based on last year, the past several years, and team talent levels. You can see those full rankings here, alongside Bill’s personal power rankings.

Some teams S&P+ likes, but voters don’t:

And S&P+ isn’t even taking LSU’s hire of top offensive coordinator Matt Canada into account.

4. Some teams S&P+ doesn’t like as much as voters do:

I’d sell on Kansas State and Washington State. Oklahoma State seems great to me, though, because Mason Rudolph and James Washington are that good.

5. Notre Dame’s always overrated, per every non-Notre Dame fan any of us has ever met in our lives. But the computers like the Irish more than the human voters do so far. The Irish aren’t going 4-8 again. The inverse is way more likely, and there’s some chance the Irish win 10 games. They’ll be ranked at some point, and probably soon.

6. Keep an eye on Tennessee. The Vols have finished each of the last two years ranked 22nd. Last year, they started No. 9, went 5-0 before cratering, Butch Jones called his players Life Champions, and the entire thing was a disappointment. This year’s team is right on the fringe of the top 25 in both the human polls and the S&P+ projection. Expectations are lower, but the Vols remain capable of doing damage. They’re ... kind of a sleeper?

7. The computers like Penn State, but not as much as the humans. The machines see a top-10 team, while the AP and Coaches Poll voters have Penn State sixth. That’s not a huge difference, but I bet it’s reflective of how purely fun PSU was last year. No voter could watch Saquon Barkley do what he did to USC and not get a little giddy. I think Penn State will finish lower than its preseason No. 6 slotting.

8. Teams at great risk of dropping out after Week 1 games:

No. 15 Georgia should be on marginal upset alert against Appalachian State. Obviously, No. 17 Florida could lose to No. 11 Michigan, but doing that without receiver Antonio Callaway wouldn’t boot UF from the top 25 altogether, unless it’s a blowout.

9. Teams with the best chance to move up into the rankings:

Those teams got by far the most voting points among teams to miss out: 98 for the Horned Frogs, 85 for the Utes, and 65 for the Irish. If the Irish win against the reigning AAC champions, they will be the first team to jump into the top 25 from the outside.

It’s a little harder to say for TCU and Utah, who aren’t playing real competition. Boise State and NC State were next in “also receiving votes,” and they’re playing much better teams than TCU and Utah are.

Also, The AP Poll doesn’t technically matter any more, now that we have midseason College Football Playoff rankings. And there’s no real sign that the preseason poll leaves any impact on the committee.