With just under two weeks until kickoff of the 2026 college football season, the first edition of the AP Top 25 was released Monday with the preseason rankings. While the AP Poll was a major point of controversy last season, it ultimately does not mean anything in comparison to the College Football Playoff rankings. Still, it offers a useful measuring stick for where teams stand and the expectations surrounding them early in the season.
https://t.co/T23NtgfCyw
— AP Top 25 (@AP_Top25) August 17, 2026
Ohio State and Oregon are 1-2 in the preseason poll while the SEC leads conferences with nine ranked teams. pic.twitter.com/KIcOlA5YyB
Every year we see several teams enter the season with high hopes that fail to live up to the hype. That could not have been more evident last season when Penn State, Clemson and LSU all entered the year ranked in the preseason top 10 before finishing the regular season with a combined record of 20-16 and well outside the Top 25.
With that in mind, here are five teams from this year's AP Preseason Top 25 that could finish the 2026 season unranked.
The last time Alabama was unranked in the AP Poll was all the way back in 2007, so I am really going out on a limb with this one. However, Kalen DeBoer has not done much to make me very confident in him at Alabama, and frankly, I think this team would be viewed much differently if their name were not simply Alabama.
The Tide lost 15 total starters from last year's team, as well as several other key contributors. The offense is where the focus will be for this Crimson Tide team, most notably at the quarterback position where it is a battle between senior Austin Mack and sophomore Keelon Russell. Both are extremely talented but lack the experience that is so valuable in the SEC. Schedule-wise it is much lighter and easier compared to what Bama may be used to, but if we see them lose a game or two that they shouldn’t, we could see the team drop off and the noise surrounding DeBoer get loud again.
As much as I think this season is the must-do-it year for Lincoln Riley at USC and I believe Jayden Maiava is one of the top QBs in the country, the Trojans face a grueling schedule. At the same time, Riley has shown nothing so far to make you trust his USC teams in big games.
The Trojans will face five teams from these Top 25 rankings, three of which are in the top six with Ohio State, Oregon and Indiana. There’s no doubt this team is talented but they need to show up in the big games, of which they have plenty this year, or it could be another overall disappointing season for Lincoln Riley in Southern California.
Josh Heupel is entering Year six of what has been a successful tenure at Tennessee. He may be facing his toughest challenge yet in 2026 having to get a young new quarterback ready to lead his veer-and-shoot offense, which puts a lot of pressure on the QB. The Vols have a battle at the position heading into the season between George MacIntyre and true freshman Faizon Brandon.
Defensively, Tennessee brought in Jim Knowles as defensive coordinator in hopes of improving a side of the ball that has commonly been an issue during Heupel’s time there. Knowles’ defense is known to be very intricate and confusing at times, making it tough to learn, especially in the first year. That was something commonly brought up last season with Penn State’s struggles when Knowles was their DC. The Vols really don’t have super high expectations coming into the year, and it could be more of a figure-it-out season with several new pieces as well as a young and inexperienced QB.
Picking a team that landed right at No. 25 in the Top 25 to finish unranked is cheap, but I do think Missouri could really struggle this season. They do have arguably the best running back in college football in Ahmad Hardy, who is coming off an offseason gunshot wound injury. Even if Hardy is back to what he was last year physically, he will have a ton of the opposing defenses’ attention solely focused on stopping him. The Tigers brought in QB Austin Simmons from Ole Miss, where he started two games before his season was derailed by injury and he ultimately lost the starting job to Trinidad Chambliss. When Simmons was playing though, he really struggled at times and looked far from the highly touted prospect he was hyped up to be.
The schedule is doing Eli Drinkwitz’s team no favors with five matchups against teams in this preseason Top 25. The Tigers very likely could start the year off hot, but once they get into the meat of their SEC schedule and down the stretch of the season, we could see a hard fall-off.
As mentioned, we saw three teams from last year’s preseason top 10 end the year unranked, so why not take a shot at one this year? There may not be a better roster in college football than Texas’, however, I could very well see the wheels completely falling off and maybe something similar to what happened with James Franklin and Brian Kelly last year happening to Steve Sarkisian.
Like I said, it’s hard to find holes in this roster. On offense they’ve got QB Arch Manning, who is coming off a hot end to last season. They also have a loaded running back room and a receiver room that returns Ryan Wingo and brought in Cam Coleman. Defensively, Texas returns six starters, including one of the best defenders in the country in Colin Simmons.
Basically, this prediction relies on Texas getting off to an ugly start and the Longhorns falling off from there. That very well could happen with three of Texas’ first five games coming against No. 1 Ohio State, No. 20 Tennessee, and No. 10 Oklahoma, meaning a 2-3 start is certainly in the realm of possibility. And after that, they still have to play No. 9 Ole Miss, No. 11 LSU, and No. 8 Texas A&M in the back half of their season.
Add us as a preferred source on Google