Back to poll results >>

cyberchaox Ballot for 2026 Week 5

Ballot Type: Human

Submitted: Sept. 26, 2026, 11:50 p.m.

Overall Rationale: No teams under .500, and teams with losses must be ranked behind all teams they lost to until a point in the season is reached when it is impossible to rank 25 teams in this way.

Rank Team Reason
1 Georgia Bulldogs Arkansas > Tulsa > Oklahoma State > Oregon > (USC and) Boise State > Western Michigan > Michigan
2 Texas Longhorns Win over Ohio State still holds weight.
3 Notre Dame Fighting Irish Wisconsin win is a quality win now.
4 Utah Utes Arkansas > Tulsa > Oklahoma State > Oregon > (USC and) Boise State > Western Michigan > Michigan
5 Florida Gators Decisively beat Ole Miss, which is arguably as quality a win as you can get right now, and Auburn looks like a quality win too.
6 Indiana Hoosiers ...Okay this one's probably mostly poll inertia, but maybe Northwestern is actually good.
7 Alabama Crimson Tide Does Bama ever stop? They just keep winning big over P4 teams.
8 Miami Hurricanes Wake Forest is a quality win now.
9 BYU Cougars More poll inertia.
10 Ohio State Buckeyes Eye test still says they're a good team even if the quality wins aren't there yet.
11 Iowa Hawkeyes ...Thank God they pulled that one out, since I'm still counting WMU as having beaten Michigan for the purposes of "must be ranked behind all teams that beat you" (though paradoxically I'm still counting their record as 2-2 for the purposes of "must be at least .500") and...Arkansas > Tulsa > Oklahoma State > Oregon > (USC and) Boise State > Western Michigan > Michigan
12 Ole Miss Rebels LSU is still a definite quality win. Louisville...eh. Their big win over SMU lost some luster today when the Mustangs struggled with Missouri State, a team that directly got blasted by Texas A&M by 50 and transitively got blasted by Penn State by 51 (by way of Marshall).
13 Texas Tech Red Raiders
14 Mississippi State Bulldogs
15 Auburn Tigers The three P4 teams they've faced so far are a combined 9-0 when not facing them. That's SOS if I've ever seen it, and they went 2-1 in those three games.
16 Wisconsin Badgers Wisconsin was better than their record last year, hidden by a brutal conference SOS (they nearly dodged every bad team in the conference), but this is still a surprise. Then again, last year's record is a meaningless prediction metric in the age of NIL.
17 James Madison Dukes Recent FCS champions who didn't miss a step upon transitioning to FBS, part 1.
18 North Dakota State Bison Recent FCS champions who didn't miss a step upon transitioning to FBS, part 2.
19 LSU Tigers Clemson has rebounded to 3-1, Texas A&M...was probably overrated but it's still a ranked win, and due to the fact that their schedule thus far has had no middle ground between "road game against a P4 team where they hung tough but ultimately didn't come close to the upset" and "home game against an FCS team where they put up 80", I can't definitively prove that Louisiana Tech WON'T run the table in the Sun Belt West and be 10-2 heading into a CCG against James Madison.
20 UCLA Bruins Speaking of 2025 non-bowl Big Ten teams...
21 Arkansas Razorbacks Arkansas > Tulsa > Oklahoma State > Oregon > (USC and) Boise State > Western Michigan > Michigan
22 Tennessee Volunteers And the "impressive in defeat" award of the week goes to...!
23 Virginia Tech Hokies James Franklin continues to do James Franklin things.
24 Duke Blue Devils The defending ACC Champions are still good.
25 Cincinnati Bearcats A back-and-forth battle of unbeatens goes in favor of the Bearcats.

Next five: Wake Forest, Kentucky, Nebraska, Tulsa, Pittsburgh

Back to poll results >>