Preseason Coaches Poll Ranks Florida State #1

The preseason Amway Coaches Poll, which was released earlier today, has ranked Florida State as the #1 team in college football.  The Coaches Poll awarded the defending national champion Seminoles with 56 out of 62 overall first-place votes, an impressive total for the only team from the ACC ranked in the preseason top ten.  The Alabama Crimson Tide clinched the #2 spot, the Oklahoma Sooners ended up at #3, while the Oregon Ducks and the Auburn Tigers found themselves at the #4 and #5 positions respectively.  The rest of the top ten features two Big Ten teams:  Ohio State (#6) and Michigan State (#8), one from PAC-12 (#7 UCLA), one more from the SEC (#9 South Carolina), and a BIG XII team (#10 Baylor).  So, it appears that each of the "Five Power Conferences" has at least one team in the top ten.  As for the entire rankings, teams from two conferences, the SEC and the PAC-12, occupy thirteen out of the twenty-five places on this list.  The Big Ten and BIG XII each have four teams, and the ACC has three.  Notre Dame is on this list as a football independent, but true scheduling independence for the Fighting Irish ended last season.  Starting with the 2014 season, Notre Dame will play five ACC teams in football every year for the foreseeable future.  Finally, no teams from the "Group of Five" Conferences (e.g., American Athletic Conference, Conference USA, Mid-American Conference, Mountain West Conference, and the Sun Belt Conference) appear on this list, but that may change after the season begins.  Enjoy the upcoming weekend, everybody!!


2014 PRESEASON AMWAY COACHES POLL RANKINGS

RANK	TEAM	CONFERENCE	POINTS
1	Florida State Seminoles	ACC	1543
2	Alabama Crimson Tide	SEC	1455
3	Oklahoma Sooners	BIG XII	1382
4	Oregon Ducks	PAC-12	1314
5	Auburn Tigers	SEC	1271
6	Ohio State Buckeyes	Big Ten	1267
7	UCLA Bruins	PAC-12	1085
8	Michigan State Spartans	Big Ten	1050
9	South Carolina Gamecocks	SEC	1009
10	Baylor Bears	BIG XII	965
11	Stanford Cardinal	PAC-12	955
12	Georgia Bulldogs	SEC	905
13	LSU Tigers	SEC	833
14	Wisconsin Badgers	Big Ten	654
15	USC Trojans	PAC-12	627
16	Clemson Tigers	ACC	535
17	Notre Dame Fighting Irish	Independent*	509
18	Arizona State Sun Devils	PAC-12	358
19	Mississippi Rebels	SEC	346
20	Texas A&M Aggies	SEC	266
21	Kansas State Wildcats	BIG XII	257
22	Nebraska Cornhuskers	Big Ten	228
23	North Carolina Tar Heels	ACC	175
24	Texas Longhorns	BIG XII	143
25	Washington Huskies	PAC-12	142