SportsRatings

Week "zero" is in the past, what did we learn? Not much, since very few teams played. Still, we saw some minor changes in our projected Final Top 25. Not much at the top, with Notre Dame still at #1 with some minor adjustments to their odds, mostly random. The rest of the top ten saw some interesting minor moves: Indiana's Playoff Odds dropped a bit, as did Oregon's and Ohio State's . All three teams play USC, who beat San Jose State 42-26, a less-than-stellar result. And that decreased the value of a win over the Trojans, hence the drops of 1.5%, 1.5%, and 2.7%. But wait, Penn State's odds jumped 2.2% and they play USC too? Let's just call that a fluke buried in the simulation. Miami jumped from #10 to #7 while Texas A&M fell from #7 to #10. Again, this is probably a random move between teams that were packed tightly around that region. Their odds barely changed. And the same 12 teams are pegged to make the Playoff. That includes North Dakota St...

Here is our pre-season projected Final Top 25 Committee Rankings and analysis. We rank every team here based on what type of season they can expect to have; this is different from a pure quality rating in our Pre-season Top 138 , which doesn't worry about the schedule they will face. This ranking does. I'm going to update the pre-season numbers at the static page until the FBS kickoff on August 29 (trying to account for the 5-year eligibility court rulings if possible), and update week by week during the season of course. Notre Dame was our #2 ranked team in the pre-season top 138 but they end up #1 in the Projected Final Committee Rankings. #1 Indiana has to settle for 2nd place. Why? Schedule. Indiana plays a tough Big Ten schedule. But Notre Dame has the #69 SOS in the country, with two decent-sized hurdles in Miami and BYU (finishing #10 and #17 on this projection). The Irish have a 1 in 3 chance to go undefeated and don't have a pesky conference championship game to...

Without further ado, the SportsRatings 2026 pre-season rankings, #1 to #138 Key: 2025 record , Strength ranking for 2025, with '25 Offense and Defense ranking This is the starting basis for ranking Returning talent rank (scaled 1-138); Portal "class" ranking; " Pure " 2026 ranking; Program rank The 2026 team consists of returning players and those acquired through the Portal; this forms the bulk of a team's rating, the Pure 2026 rating. This is modified by the Program rank, which tracks the current baseline rating of the program, and accounts for recruiting 2026 projected record game-by-game (and cumulative); Bowl  eligibility odds; Rank within conference Brief rundown of team's personnel losses and portal gains  Team schedule with % chance to win for each game Schedule rundown (note: Pac-12 games with a * are tentatively scheduled and actual matchups will be determined later in the year) Updates : These notes refer to a situation not accounted fo...