AP Top 25: USF jumps into poll; record 11 SEC teams ranked despite Florida falling out

South Florida leapt into the AP Top 25 for the first time in seven years, coming in at No. 18 Sunday after upsetting Florida. The Bulls knocked the Gators from the rankings, but Missouri and Auburn entered the poll to give the SEC a record 11 ranked teams.

Ohio State remained No. 1 after a week where most of the top-10 teams cruised against overmatched foes. The Buckeyes received 57 first-place votes. Penn State was No. 2 again, followed by LSU and Oregon, which moved up two spots to No. 4. The Nittany Lions received five first-place votes, LSU got two and Oregon had one.

Miami was No. 5 and Georgia slipped two spots to No. 6, Texas held at No. 7, followed by No. 8 Notre Dame and No. 9 Illinois. The Illini are in the top 10 for the first time since 2001 after winning 45-19 at Duke. Florida State moved up four spots to No. 10.

Oklahoma jumped five spots after beating Michigan 24-13 at home Saturday night in Week 2’s only game between ranked teams. The Wolverines dropped eight spots to No. 23.

Others receiving votes: Arizona State 94, BYU 92, Georgia Tech 78, Florida 70, USC 64, TCU 58, Mississippi State 52, Louisville 49, SMU 26, Nebraska 10, Tulane 9, Baylor 7, UNLV 5, Pittsburgh 3, Navy 2, Memphis 1, Vanderbilt 1

Also considered by Ralph: TCU, Nebraska, Auburn, Mississippi State

The SEC had been the only conference to have 10 teams ranked and matched that record to start this season. That’s not quite as impressive a feat with 16 teams these days, but now the league has taken it a step further with No. 24 Missouri and No. 25 Auburn joining No. 11 South Carolina, No. 13 Oklahoma, No. 15 Tennessee, No. 16 Texas A&M, No. 17 Ole Miss and No. 19 Alabama, on top of the three top-10 teams. Florida, Mississippi State, Kentucky, Vanderbilt and Arkansas are the only unranked SEC teams.

No team in the country was facing a tougher schedule to start the season than USF, with three preseason Top 25 teams in a row. The Bulls had lost 19 consecutive games to ranked teams coming into the season.

The Bulls are now 2-0 after following up a home win against then-No. 25 Boise State by beating the Gators 18-16 on a walk-off field goal at the Swamp. Florida went from No. 13 to out of the rankings. Next up for the Bulls is a trip to No. 5 Miami on Saturday.

USF was last ranked for three weeks in the middle of the 2018 season. The Bulls were last ranked as high as they are now in 2017 when they reached No. 16.

The Bulls went 10-2 that season, but the program plummeted after that. USF had four straight losing seasons before coach Alex Golesh took over for the 2023 season. After two seven-win seasons to start Golesh’s tenure, USF looks like a favorite to win the American Conference and earn the Group of 5’s spot in the College Football Playoff.

“We’ve got to be able to handle success,” Golesh told ESPN after the upset. “This ain’t the same old South Florida, my brother.”

Echoes of 2007

College football fans first got acquainted with USF when the Bulls were one of the breakout stars of maybe the craziest season in recent history.

USF started 6-0 with victories against Auburn, North Carolina and then-Big East rival West Virginia to reach No. 2 in the rankings in mid-October. It was a stunning ascent for a program that was launched in 1997 and didn’t start competing at the highest level of Division I football until 2000.

That was a wild season across college football. USF was one of nine teams to hold the No. 2 ranking from preseason to the final poll, and LSU became the first national champion to lose two games since 1960. The Bulls stumbled in Big East play on the way to a 9-4 record and an unranked finish that still represented the best season in the program’s short history.

USF’s last road victory against a ranked team before Saturday night was a memorable upset of Notre Dame under coach Skip Holtz, son of the former Fighting Irish coach Lou Holtz, to start the 2011 season. Those Bulls finished 5-7.

It wasn’t until 2016 that USF finished a season ranked. Willie Taggart’s team went 11-2 and landed 19th in the final AP poll. Charlie Strong took over in 2017, and the core of Taggart’s team ripped off another excellent season. It’s been a struggle since, as USF watched its I-4 rival UCF get a power-conference promotion to the Big 12.

How I voted

Let’s talk about mismatches and how I factor them into my voting.

First off, Ohio State, Georgia, Miami, South Carolina and Florida State were among the ranked teams that, as far as I am concerned, had the week off. I’m not holding those scrimmages against FCS teams against them, but they are meaningless. I know Georgia’s offense got glitchy against Austin Peay, but trying to draw conclusions from that in Week 2 is a waste of time.

Then there’s the next level of mismatch: Penn State, LSU, Texas, Clemson and Texas A&M all faced G5 teams that are simply not built to challenge them. Clemson got itself into a legitimate pickle, falling behind 16-0 against Troy in the first half before getting its act together with a 27-0 run to end the game.

I docked Clemson a couple of spots from No. 9 to No. 11 on my ballot, but part of that was making room in my top 10 for Oklahoma.

Penn State and LSU both had spotty offensive performances, leading only 10-0 at halftime, but they were never in danger of losing.

We tend to overanalyze these early-season games because we have so little information and it seems ridiculous later in the season that we spent time and energy obsessing over what amounts to about four possessions. Yes, it’s better to do what Alabama did to ULM (73-0), but I am not going to get bogged down in this stuff this early.

Everybody handled their business. We’re moving on.

Then there is what Oregon did to Oklahoma State. The Cowboys looked like they could be one of the worst teams in the Power 4 coming into the season, so again, I don’t want to overreact to that 69-3 demolition in Eugene on Saturday. Montana State, last week’s Oregon opponent, might be better than Oklahoma State. I gave the Ducks a bump up one spot to No. 7 on my ballot, two spots better than I had them in the preseason.

If you think the Ducks should be ahead of Penn State or Georgia, that’s fine. It would be hard for me to argue based on Oregon’s utter dominance. But none of those teams have faced enough competition through two weeks for me to justify rearranging them.

I get voting based on results, but if you lean too hard into that early in the season, you end up over-emphasizing tiny sample sizes.

In and out

In addition to Florida, SMU and Arizona State, two of last season’s surprising CFP teams, fell from the rankings after losing in heartbreaking fashion.

The Mustangs blew a 14-point fourth-quarter lead and lost 48-45 to Baylor in overtime. The Sun Devils erased a 17-point halftime deficit at Mississippi State but gave up a long touchdown pass in the final minute to lose 24-20.

Missouri jumped in for the first time this season after knocking off Kansas in a renewal of their Border War rivalry.

Auburn got in more on the strength of last week’s victory than Saturday’s against Ball State. The Tigers opened the season with a road win against Baylor. Auburn is ranked for the first time since early November 2021, meaning the Tigers and Crimson Tide are ranked together for the first time in three-plus seasons.

Next week

The SEC’s marquee matchups start in Week 3, though with one fewer ranked showdown than expected:

• No. 6 Georgia is at No. 15 Tennessee (3:30 p.m. ET, ABC), with the Bulldogs having won eight straight meetings of the old SEC East rivals.

• Florida’s loss took some of the steam out of its trip to No. 3 LSU (7:30 p.m. ET, ABC), though the game became even more crucial for Gators coach Billy Napier.

• No. 16 Texas A&M visits No. 8 Notre Dame (7:30 p.m. ET, NBC). The Irish had Week 2 off after losing a close one to Miami to open that season.

• And, of course, now the No. 5 Hurricanes face a second ranked opponent at home with No. 18 USF coming to town (4:30 p.m. ET, The CW)

(Photo: James Gilbert / Getty Images)

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