By popular demand, it is now time to unveil the first edition of the 2018 SwampSwami College Football Top 25! Woo-Hoo!
For those who were not readers of my blog in 2017, my college football rankings are not released until after the “silly season” of the opening month has been completed. By now, each of the Top 25 college football teams has played one or more games against legitimate competition (OK – Alabama hasn’t played the Raiders, Browns, and Cardinals yet, but I figure that Saban’s troops would still be at least 2-1 in those games, too).
Here is my relatively simple and logical theory of how the college football teams should be ranked (Hint: just keep winning!):
- I start with a team’s final year’s Associated Press Top 25 Rank. If a team was ranked at the end of last year and has not lost a game yet in 2018, those teams are given the priority to start the new season. Why? What more can they do other than keep winning? This group represents teams #1-10 in this first SwampSwami poll of the 2018 season.
- The next group of teams include the remaining undefeated schools as of this week. They are #11-14 in my first poll. I have ranked that group based on their most impressive win in the 2018 season. Sadly for Colorado fans, the Buffs’ opponents have included 0-4 Nebraska and 0-4 UCLA at this point.
- The final group in our first poll of the year (#15-24) include the 1-loss teams. As with the undefeated group of teams, I give a priority to their ranking in the final AP Top 25 poll ending 2017’s season.
- This week’s #25 team is Missouri. Their lone loss was to the #2 team in this poll (Georgia).
| # | Team | W | L | 2017 AP Rank | Best win/loss in 2018 |
| 1 | Alabama | 5 | 0 | 1 | |
| 2 | Georgia | 5 | 0 | 2 | |
| 3 | Oklahoma | 5 | 0 | 3 | |
| 4 | Clemson | 5 | 0 | 4 | |
| 5 | Ohio State | 5 | 0 | 5 | |
| 6 | UCF | 4 | 0 | 6 | |
| 7 | Notre Dame | 5 | 0 | 11 | |
| 8 | LSU | 5 | 0 | 18 | |
| 9 | South Florida | 4 | 0 | 21 | |
| 10 | NC State | 4 | 0 | 23 | |
| 11 | Kentucky | 5 | 0 | 26-16 @ 4-1 Florida | |
| 12 | West Virginia | 4 | 0 | 42-34 @ 3-2 Texas Tech | |
| 13 | Cincinnati | 5 | 0 | 34-30 over 2-2 Ohio U. | |
| 14 | Colorado | 4 | 0 | 45-16 @ 1-4 Colo. St. | |
| 15 | Wisconsin | 3 | 1 | 7 | |
| 16 | Penn State | 4 | 1 | 8 | |
| 17 | Auburn | 4 | 1 | 10 | |
| 18 | Miami (Fla) | 4 | 1 | 13 | |
| 19 | Oklahoma State | 4 | 1 | 14 | |
| 20 | Michigan State | 3 | 1 | 15 | |
| 21 | Washington | 4 | 1 | 16 | |
| 22 | Stanford | 4 | 1 | 20 | |
| 23 | Boise State | 3 | 1 | 22 | |
| 24 | Virginia Tech | 3 | 1 | 24 | |
| 25 | Missouri | 3 | 1 | Lost to #2 Georgia 43-29 |