Florida State was dropped from the Associated Press college football poll on Tuesday after starting the season with an 0-2 record, becoming just the third team to go from a preseason top 10 ranking to being unranked in the first regular-season poll since the rankings expanded to 25 in 1989.
Georgia remained No. 1, receiving 57 first-place votes after starting the season with a dominating win over then-No. 14 Clemson. The Tigers remained No. 25.
Ohio State finished second with five first-place votes. Texas, third, and Alabama, fourth, each moved up one spot, putting three Southeastern Conference teams in the top four along with Georgia.
No. 5 Notre Dame moved up two spots after opening the season with a win over No. 20 Texas A&M, which dropped in the rankings.
Florida State has been the biggest disappointment of the early season. The defending Atlantic Coast Conference champion lost its Week 0 game in Dublin, Ireland, to ACC rival Georgia Tech and then lost again Monday night at home to Boston College.
No other team in the preseason Top 25 this year has lost to an unranked opponent to open the season. Florida State did it twice as a double-digit favorite and didn’t receive a single vote from the AP poll.
In the past 35 years, two other teams that were in the preseason top 10 but fell out of the top 25 after Week 1 were Michigan in 2007 after losing to No. 5 Appalachian State and Clemson in 2008. The Tigers were ranked No. 9 but opened with a crushing loss to Alabama and dropped.
Mississippi remains at No. 6. Oregon drops four spots to No. 7 after a close win over Idaho. Penn State remains at No. 8. Missouri moves up two spots to No. 9, giving the SEC five teams in the top 10. Michigan drops one spot to No. 10.
Georgia Tech’s 2-0 start has helped the 23rd-ranked Yellowjackets reach the conference for the first time since 2015.
Poll Point
Because Florida State started its season a week before most other teams in the country, it joins the exclusive club of teams that started the season with an 0-2 record and each loss came while ranked in the top 10.
Notre Dame was the last team to do so in 2022, when the Fighting Irish started the season ranked No. 5, lost to No. 2 Ohio State in the opener, and then were defeated at home by Marshall the following week when they were ranked eighth. The Irish finished 9-4.
Ohio State opened the 1986 season ranked ninth and lost two straight games to ranked opponents, No. 5 Alabama and No. 17 Washington. The Buckeyes were ranked 10th when they played the Huskies. Ohio State finished the season with a 10-3 record.
The 1967 Texas team and 1952 TCU also started 0-2 while being ranked in the top 10 of both games.
Florida State is just the second ranked team to lose twice before the first regular-season polls were released, joining Kentucky in 1951. The Wildcats went from No. 6 to No. 17 while having a 1-2 record to start the season, losing to No. 11 Texas and Mississippi.
Florida State will have a week off before resuming its schedule with home games against Memphis and new ACC member California before a trip to SMU and then a home game against Clemson.
“You have a team that nobody envisioned being in the position we’re in and there’s disappointment, there’s defeat, but I believe in what this team can do,” coach Mike Norvell said after the loss to BC. “I believe in what this team can accomplish.”
Move up
The cities that rose the most in the Top 25 were Miami and Southern California.
The Hurricanes moved up seven spots to No. 12 after beating Florida at The Swamp and have their best ranking since breaking into the top 10 at the end of the 2020 season.
No. 13 USC jumped 10 spots after beating LSU by a late touchdown on Sunday night in Las Vegas. The loss dropped LSU to No. 18.
The Trojans started last season ranked No. 6, but finished unranked after a disappointing 8-5 season with the 2022 Heisman Trophy winner Caleb Williams.
In and out
The only other team to make the rankings this week, along with Georgia Tech, is ACC school Louisville. The Cardinals were among the top unranked teams in the preseason polls and are currently ranked No. 22.
Conference call
Even though Florida State and Clemson started the season with 0-3 records, the ACC has one more team in the rankings this week than last:
SECONDS – 8 (Numbers 1, 3, 4, 6, 9, 14, 16, 18).
Big Ten – 6 (Nos. 2, 7, 8, 10, 13, 21).
ACC – 5 (Numbers 12, 22, 23, 24, 25).
Big 12 – 5 (Nos. 11, 16, 17, 19, 20).
Independence – 1 (Number 5).
Rating vs Rating
No. 3 Texas takes on No. 10 Michigan. The first game of the regular season is a top 10 showdown at the Big House.
No. 14 Tennessee plays No. 24 NC State in Charlotte, North Carolina. An exciting SEC-ACC matchup.
