Scott Van Pelt opines on pointlessness of preseason CFB rankings
· Yahoo Sports
The preseason college football coaches’ poll was released last week, and it has done its job. People are arguing about the rankings, and the air suddenly feels a little crisper. One person who doesn’t appreciate the preseason rankings is ESPN’s Scott Van Pelt. On a recent podcast he expressed frustration with how pointless these rankings actually are.
Basically, “no one knows anything” right now in Van Pelt’s estimation. And that’s especially true during the NIL and transfer portal era when there’s even more annual roster turnover than ever before. “You’re selling stories and people and programs right now in August without any real knowledge for sure about what’s what.”
Visit likesport.biz for more information.
Here’s the full clip from the SVPod:
MORE: 4 dark horse candidates who could win the Heisman Trophy in 2026
“Well, look at last year as an example of where teams began the season in in rankings and it’ll happen again because there’ll be teams that you just presume are going to be good based on the pedigree of their past,” said Van Pelt. “Some of the people that you know looking at the portal acquisitions and thinking that that should work, but you don’t know. And then there’ll be some teams. Look, we both liked Clemson this time last year and Penn State both liked them. Why? Because they had continuity at the quarterback position. They had a bunch of guys that we knew, liked, and trusted. Clemson and Penn State both, and the wheels fall off.”
16-0 Indiana started last season at No. 20
MORE: College football realignment may not be done after late Protect College Sports Act provision
Of course, Indiana is the ultimate proof that preseason rankings mean nothing. The Hoosiers won three games in 2023 and came into the 2024 season unranked. That was Curt Cignetti’s first season in Bloomington. The Hoosiers got all the way up to No. 5, won 11 games and finished the season ranked No. 10. Despite the success they were No. 20 in the 2025 preseason rankings.
Indiana then won their first game against Old Dominion and dropped to No. 23. After a 3-0 start they had only moved up to No. 19. Then they took on No. 9 Illinois, another great example of how little sense the polls make. The Fighting Illini had finished ’24 ranked No. 16, which you’ll note was lower than Indiana. Then they were ranked No. 12 in the ’25 preseason poll.
Illinois ended up going 9-4 and finished the season unranked. And yet despite the fact that they weren’t actually a top 25 team last season, their inflated preseason ranking was the only reason that Indiana was anywhere near the top 10 before their early October showdown with Oregon. The eventually unranked Illinois team was the only ranked team Indiana faced in September.
If voters had known Illinois was going to be a 9-win team, then Indiana beating Oregon would have been considered a much bigger upset in the moment. Instead, it was a matchup between two top 10 teams. That probably made CBS very happy. Who wouldn’t want to promote a matchup between the No. 3 and No. 7 teams in the nation?
MORE: 2026 ACC football power rankings: Can anyone unseat Miami?
Rankings sell games
And that’s the real reason we have the rankings. They give networks things to promote. Otherwise, they’re really quite useless. Teams play 12-games with full conference schedules and then play conference championships to decide who the best teams are. Then there’s an ever-expanding, multi-round college football playoff that crowns a champion.
What good does it to know that 9-4 Iowa was ranked No. 17 in the final poll of the season while 9-4 Michigan was ranked No. 21, right behind 9-4 USC? Right now, those schools are respectively No. 19, No. 16 and No. 14 in the preseason rankings.
Keep that in mind when you’re sitting down to watch those early season top 25 matchups.
— Enjoy free coverage of the top news & trending stories with The Big Lead Newsletter —