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Tornadohunter24 Ballot for 2025 Week 2

Ballot Type: Human

Submitted: Sept. 5, 2025, 10:53 a.m.

Overall Rationale: Well, there weren't as many upsets as I'd have hoped for (because I am deranged), but that was certainly a fun Week 0/Week 1! Always fun to have college football ruining my Saturdays. Before we get started, I just wanted to remind you of a few caveats to my top 25: I'm including at least 5 spots for the G5, as an indicator of who I think is favored to make a run at the Playoffs out of those conferences. I also love pre-conference play variance, so you'll see a lot of that too. In addition, this poll, by nature, is meant to be overreactive. I'm not here to try to be predictive - I want this to be strictly resume, even if that resume consists of a single game. I'm not here trying to justify every single one of my top 25 staying in the top 25 week-to-week; that's just lame. And it's not the point of what I want to accomplish when doing these rankings. Even still, before you crucify me for this poll ballot... allow me to explain further. Last week's poll was a *preseason poll*. It was submitted with 0 actual game analysis or even games played beyond a spring game. Why should it still dictate the rankings after the games begin to be played? Inevitably, it will still hold some amount of weight because it's not as if those rankings were entirely made out of the blue - we still have star ranking composites, camp reports, returning production, last year's records, and so forth. Hence why a team like Ohio State is still #1 even though Texas, their opponent, is now unranked. Similar stories exist for pretty much everyone, really. So, a better question: why is the top 15 (and top 25, really) the way that they are? Well, I'm glad you asked, random stranger I made up in my head to dictate this interaction! Essentially, every team in said top 15 played a Power 4 (or previously-ranked opponent, in the case of USF; and yes, for the sake of my sanity, I'm including Oregon State and Washington State as "P4-equivalent" until next year) opponent in either Week 0 or Week 1 and emerged victorious. In honor of that scheduling quirk, I've ranked all of the winners and organized them by most impressive to least impressive win based upon margin of victory, perceived opponent strength, location of the game, and any other important or relevant factors. Does this make the poll have unreasonable amounts of instability? Probably! Do I care? Not really. It's Week 1 - everyone who deserves to be ranked will become ranked again soon enough. I'm not the committee; just keep winning, and things will fall into place. That said, let's get on to the necessary business at the end of this. A lot of movement necessitates a lot of accounting. | TEAMS DROPPING OUT: Dropping Out: #2 Notre Dame Fighting Irish [0-1], #4 Clemson Tigers [0-1], #7 Texas Longhorns [0-1], #8 Alabama Crimson Tide [0-1], #12 Boise State Broncos [0-1], #16 Baylor Bears [0-1], #17 SMU Mustangs [1-0], #20 Michigan Wolverines [1-0], #24 Toledo Rockets [0-1] | HONORABLE MENTIONS: Notre Dame Fighting Irish [0-1], Clemson Tigers [0-1], Texas Longhorns [0-1], Michigan Wolverines [1-0], UNLV Rebels [2-0], BYU Cougars [1-0], Indiana Hoosiers [1-0], SMU Mustangs [1-0], Alabama Crimson Tide [0-1], Appalachian State Mountaineers [1-0]

Rank Team Reason
1 Ohio State Buckeyes [1-0] (-) | 14-2 Record Last Year (#1, Defending National Champions), defeated last week's #7 Texas 14-7 at home
2 LSU Tigers [1-0] (+8) | 9-4 Record Last Year, defeated previously-ranked #4 Clemson 17-10 on the road
3 Miami Hurricanes [1-0] (+10) | 10-3 Record Last Year (#20), defeated last year's runner-up and last week's #2 Notre Dame 27-24 at home
4 South Carolina Gamecocks [1-0] (+10) | 9-4 Record Last Year (#18), defeated Virginia Tech 24-11 in neutral-site game in Atlanta
5 Iowa State Cyclones [2-0, 1-0 in conference play] (+10) | 11-3 Record Last Year (#14, Big 12 Runners-Up), defeated previous Honorable Mention Kansas State 27-24 in Dublin, Ireland & FCS Top 10 South Dakota 55-7 at home
6 Florida State Seminoles [1-0] (NEW) | 2-10 Record Last Year, defeated previously-ranked #8 Alabama 31-17 at home
7 USF Bulls [1-0] (NEW) | 7-6 Record Last Year, defeated last week's #12 Boise State 34-7 at home
8 Auburn Tigers [1-0] (NEW) | 5-7 Record Last Year, defeated last week's #16 Baylor 38-24 on the road
9 Tennessee Volunteers [1-0] (NEW) - Previously Honorable Mentions | 10-3 Record Last Year (#11), defeated Syracuse 45-26 in neutral-site game in Atlanta
10 Utah Utes [1-0] (NEW) | 5-7 Record Last Year, defeated UCLA 43-10 on the road
11 TCU Horned Frogs [1-0] (NEW) | 9-4 Record Last Year, defeated Bill Belichick's North Carolina 48-14 on the road
12 Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets [1-0] (+9) | 7-6 Record Last Year, defeated Deion Sanders's Colorado 27-20 on the road
13 Tulane Green Wave [1-0] (NEW) - Previously Honorable Mentions | 9-5 Record Last Year (American Runners-Up), defeated Northwestern 23-3 at home
14 California Golden Bears [1-0] (NEW) | 6-7 Record Last Year, defeated Oregon State 34-15 on the road
15 Nebraska Cornhuskers [1-0] (NEW) | 7-6 Record Last Year, defeated Cincinnati 20-17 in neutral-site game in Kansas City
16 Penn State Nittany Lions [1-0] (-13) | 13-3 Record Last Year (#4, B1G Runners-Up), defeated Nevada 46-11 at home
17 Georgia Bulldogs [1-0] (-12) | 11-3 Record Last Year (#5, SEC Champions), defeated Marshall 45-7 at home
18 Oregon Ducks [1-0] (-12) | 13-1 Record Last Year (#3, B1G Champions), defeated FCS top-10 Montana State 59-13 at home
19 Illinois Fighting Illini [1-0] (-8) | 10-3 Record Last Year (#16), defeated FCS Western Illinois 52-3 at home
20 Texas Tech Red Raiders [1-0] (-5) | 8-5 Record Last Year, defeated FCS Arkansas-Pine Bluff 67-7 at home
21 Florida Gators [1-0] (-2) | 8-5 Record Last Year, defeated FCS LIU 55-0 at home
22 Arizona State Sun Devils [1-0] (-13) | 11-3 Record Last Year (#7, Big 12 Champions), defeated FCS Northern Arizona 38-19 at home
23 James Madison Dukes [1-0] (-1) | 9-4 Record Last Year, defeated FCS Weber State 45-10 at home
24 Memphis Tigers [1-0] (-1) | 11-2 Record Last Year (#25), defeated FCS Chattanooga 45-10 at home
25 WKU Hilltoppers [2-0, 1-0 in conference play] (-) | 8-6 Record Last Year (CUSA Runners-Up), defeated Sam Houston 41-24 at home & FCS North Alabama 55-6 at home

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