Welcome back to the first top 20 ranking of the 2026 season. It’s good to be back in this space and ready to lock in for another season of college football. As always, change continues to happen everywhere in this sport. The Pac-12 is back as a real league again (although not with power conference status) with Boise State, Colorado State, Fresno State, San Diego State, and Utah State ditching the Mountain West for their new home. Also, Texas State left the Sun Belt for the Pac-12, too. The remaining list of conference changes include:

Louisiana Tech: Conference USA —> Sun Belt
North Dakota State: Missouri Valley (FCS) —> Mountain West
Northern Illinois: MAC —> Mountain West
Sacramento State: Big Sky (FCS) —> MAC
UTEP: Conference USA —> Mountain West

The Conference USA (10), Mountain West (10), and Pac-12 (8) still remain relatively small conferences for modern standards. Nonetheless, they will try to persevere on in this billion dollar industry.

Some rule changes to get acquainted with for 2026:

*No suspension for the following half for your first targeting penalty of the season. Although, the second targeting penalty of the season follows the ‘old’ rule of being suspended for the following half, and a third targeting call includes the following full game as a suspension.

*OPI is now a 10-yard penalty rather than 15-yards.

*Two challenges are allowed, and a head coach gains a third if one of their first two challenges are correct.

*New playoff rules: All Power 4 conference champions get a bid, Notre Dame is in with a top 12 ranking, and the single highest G6 team gets a spot but does not need to be a conference champion.

Northwestern has new digs.

We also have one new stadium opening up this season. Northwestern is set to welcome hundreds of fans to their new $850 million stadium still called Ryan Field. However, they will play their first two home games at the Northwestern Medicine Field at Martin Stadium on campus where they’ve been for the past couple years with an October 2nd night game against Penn State set to open up their new home.

Ranked to Unranked from 2025:

This is one of my favorite things to write every season. It really shows how hard it is to rank teams and how stupid each and every season turns out, despite our best efforts to accurately predict things. From the 2025 pre-season top 20 (big yikes all around):

• #2 Clemson – They started 1-3 and ended up losing 6 games. The Dabo hype train has slowed to a halt.
• #6 LSU – A 4-0 start and things seemed well. But no, the Tigers faced 6 ranked teams from late September, lost each game, and Brian Kelly was fired.
• #7 Penn State – The Nittany Lions were THIS close to wins over Oregon and Indiana. This was among 6 straight losses and patience ran out for James Franklin.
• #11 SMU – Not quite the season they expected, finishing just outside the final AP Poll.
• #12 Arizona State – Picking up 8 wins wasn’t enough to stay ranked.
• #13 South Carolina – A pure stink bomb season and 4-8 finish.
• #14 Kansas State – Five out of their six losses were really close but the Wildcats weren’t nationally relevant in 2025.
• #15 Tennessee – The Vols faded as the season progressed, losing all 4 games to ranked teams, and finishing 8-5 overall.
• #16 Pittsburgh – Four regular season losses and a bowl game loss to East Carolina moved them out of the rankings.
• #18 Louisville – A weird season featuring a 4-0 start, bowl win, and victory over Miami in Hard Rock Stadium. But close losses to Virginia and Clemson, plus especially one to a bad California team, kept them out of the AP Poll in the end.
• #19 Boise State – We thought this might be one of Notre Dame’s top opponents, but the Broncos lost 5 games by a combined 109 points and were never respected.
• #20 Illinois – A nine-win season yes, but blasted by Indiana among a couple other poor defeats, plus a really bad defeat at Wisconsin.

Of note, I had eventual National Champion Indiana unranked and among the small group of teams just on the outside looking in. Surely lightning wouldn’t strike twice, I wrote. Whoops.

18 Stripes Top 20 Ranking

*Indicates week 0 game.

I feel pretty good about the top 9 teams in the rankings and would probably break them up into a solidly A group through Texas with a 1B group through Ole Miss. Everyone in both groups has a proven quarterback to a certain level and in the NIL era it’s easier than ever for the top teams to reload. Also, only Oregon and Georgia from that top list were not in the top 12 of the 247 Transfer Portal Rankings. Famous last words, but the top half of this 2026 season ranking seems to be way, way, way more powerful than the bottom half. I’d be shocked if a team outside this top 9 or 10 wins the National Championship, especially in the playoff era. No way.

Texas Tech through Oklahoma all feel like they could be pretty good teams but there are much more obvious flaws. We don’t need to discuss the chaos surrounding the Red Raiders this off-season. Alabama still has talent but not like in the past, and they need to figure out their quarterback situation. BYU isn’t that talented in the grand scheme. No one should bet big on USC! I like the culture Elko has built in College Station, although they’re breaking in a lot of new pieces (like at OC) with a much tougher schedule than last year. There’s a little too much love for the Sooners–they haven’t proven to be consistent and their schedule is also challenging.

Are the days of Alabama being great over, over?

SMU, I mean I guess? I think they’re going to be pretty good on offense but there are a lot of holes to plug on defense–there’s a reason FEI only has them 26th in the pre-season rankings. Still, I’m trying to fit in some ACC teams and the Mustangs miss both Miami and Clemson during the regular season.

Penn State may feel like a bit of a flier to some. They had crazy roster turnover but I like the stability of Matt Campbell with quarterback Rocco Becht coming over together from Ames. Plus, I don’t think the Big Ten is nearly as deep as pre-season prognosticators say and the Nittany Lions miss both Oregon and Ohio State.

Year two of Mason Heintschel is a buy for me in a weak ACC. Pitt were my “bet the over” team last year and that cashed out. I think they’ll do it again.

Vanderbilt is the 8th SEC team in this ranking, I know it’s a lot. They are also on track to start true freshman Jared Curtis. However, I’m ready for the ‘Dores to move on from the toxic Diego Pavia era and I think they have a sneaky good roster in the SEC. Clark Lea DGT™ again.

Now this is something new.

The G5 remains a mess and here I am putting Boise State now in the Pac-12 in the last spot of the rankings. They open at Oregon, too! Did you know that the Pac-12 is introducing a final week flex schedule for the whole conference? From the league:

For the final week of the regular season, Week 13, the Pac-12 will feature a first-of-its-kind flex scheduling model in which the league retains the right to adjust matchups based on the best interests of the conference, including College Football Playoff (CFP) considerations at that time.

Just on the Outside

Utah
Tennessee
Clemson
Michigan
Washington
Iowa
Kansas State

For one reason or another I didn’t like these teams quite enough to put them in the pre-season ranking. Utah is breaking in a new coach and moving on from their all-time winningest leader. That guy is now at Michigan but I think Bryce Underwood is going to torpedo their season one way or another. Tennessee’s schedule is brutal and they don’t have a dude at quarterback to run Heupel’s offense. Clemson has been on a slow decline. I expect Washington to be solid and maybe the best of this bunch. Iowa has to rebuild too much on defense and we know the offense won’t pick up the slack. The Kansas State defense is likely pretty leaky, although senior year Avery Johnson with some decent weapons around him in Collin Klein’s offense could be fun.

G5 to Watch

North Dakota State

I did the research and I think North Dakota State is the best FCS program to move up to FBS, perhaps ever? Looking at the list of teams from the past Boise State jumps out as a huge success story but they were still a pretty modest FCS team throughout the 1980’s and 1990’s before moving up in 1996. NDSU has won 39 conference championships and 18 National Championships.

One of the best FCS teams in history has moved up to the big league.

The ESPN pre-season FPI has North Dakota State 5th best in the Mountain West. Are we sure they won’t be winning this league in year one? Interestingly, the 4 teams ranked above the Bison according to ESPN (UNLV, Hawaii, New Mexico, and Air Force) will all be road games in 2026. They also travel to Hawaii. Out of conference, they also travel to new MAC team Sacramento State. Despite worries about body clocks I think this can easily be a 8 or 9-win team.

Bet the Over?

Virginia Tech: 6.5 Wins

The Hokies haven’t won at least 8 games in a season since 2019 and they’ve only been nationally relevant for one season dating all the way back to 2011. It’s wild how long they’ve been off the radar and haven’t bounced back in a weak ACC. I think that starts to end in 2026. Virginia Tech has a nice mix of returning starters, did really well in the transfer portal, and should start developing into a program that is a lot more difficult to beat. James Franklin isn’t a wizard but this is a pretty low bar to clear back to respectability.

Franklin seems to have updated his eyeglass game, +1 win?

Road trips to Clemson, SMU, and Miami (over a 5-week stretch no less) is not ideal. But, even accepting 3 losses there who are the next toughest opponents on this Hokies schedule? VMI, Old Dominion, and Maryland (in College Park) is on the easier side for non-league games among Power programs. Then the next toughest ACC games should be Pitt, Georgia Tech, and Virginia–all at home in Blacksburg. I think Franklin gets at least 7 wins and is a nice surprise for 2026.

Bet the Under?

Michigan: 8.5 Wins

We cashed out a winner here in this section taking the under on 9.5 wins for Michigan. We are back in 2026 as Vegas has dropped the Wolverines down to 8.5 wins but we’re still hitting that under again anyway. It’s expected that Michigan will take a big step back on defense and while they should be able to carve out a solid running game on offense I’m selling quarterback Bryce Underwood in every way imaginable. I think there’s a chance he’s a generational flop for a no. 1 recruit.

The bench is that way.

Michigan does open up the first month of the season at home but the Sooners are coming to town in week 2 and Iowa closes things out in September. I see them starting out 2-2 and then sputtering on the road against Minnesota where the sports talk is going to overwhelm their struggling offense with Penn State and Indiana looming. With road trips to Oregon and Ohio State I’m envisioning a 6-6 type of season. Let it be so.

Hardest Schedule

Arkansas

Do you think new head coach Ryan Silverfield looked at this 2026 schedule before taking the job with the Hogs? While opening up the first season of 9 league games within the SEC, Arkansas has also scheduled a road game at Utah in week two. They do open up with North Alabama (a poor team from the FCS) and host Tulsa late in September. They’ll need both of those wins in a bad way.

Good luck!

Home games against Georgia, Tennessee, Missouri, South Carolina, and LSU are combined with visits to Texas A&M, Vanderbilt, Auburn, and Texas. All of this fun for a program that went 2-10 overall and winless within the SEC last year. In fact, they haven’t won a SEC game since late October 2024 against Mississippi State. It may not be getting better soon.

Easiest Schedule

Texas Tech

Both Virginia and Purdue deserve a shout in this section. The Hoos game in Brazil against NC State got moved back to Charlottesville, and while they play West Virginia in Charlotte out of conference, they miss Miami, Clemson, Louisville, and Pittsburgh in the ACC. The Boilers have Notre Dame and road games at Penn State and Indiana but a shockingly comfortable Big Ten slate otherwise.

However, we can’t sit back and say nothing because Texas Tech’s schedule is a joke.

Laughing at this schedule.

The Red Raiders are loaded up on Abilene Christian, Oregon State, and Sam Houston outside of the league. After facing BYU twice last year, including in the Big 12 Championship, they miss the Cougars in the regular season. They also miss Utah–an early road game last year where the Red Raiders staked a claim as a very good team and on track for the playoffs. I guess right now their premier game of the season comes in week 3 against Houston!?? They’ll need a team or two to surprise in the Big XII because even at 11-1 they will not be ranked over hardly any 2-loss teams throughout the country.