Composite college football top 25 rankings for 2024: Georgia, Ohio State, Texas are consensus top teams

Bill Bender

Composite college football top 25 rankings for 2024: Georgia, Ohio State, Texas are consensus top teams image

College football’s list season is here ahead of a landmark college football season. 

It’s the first year of the 12-team College Football Playoff. Massive realignment has changed conferences. Yet the time-honored tradition of preseason top 25 lists remains unchanged. 

Sporting News released its Preseason Top 25 on Wednesday. Our next move is to look around at other preseason publications to find a consensus Top 25. We achieved that by looking at seven more recent top 25 lists. That includes 247Sports.com, The Athletic, Athlon, CBS Sports, ESPN, Sports Illustrated and USA Today. We will update this as more preseason rankings come out this summer. It is a better indicator of what the preseason AP Top 25 might look like in August. 

Georgia is a unanimous No. 1 across those sites. The Bulldogs are looking for a third national championship in four seasons under Kirby Smart.

Ohio State received seven second-place across those eight sites. The Buckeyes had a monumental offseason under coach Ryan Day in the transfer portal, and will be heavily favored to win the new 18-team Big Ten. 

Texas – which made its first College Football Playoff appearance last season – is No. 3 The Longhorns have improved under fourth-year coach Steve Sarkisian and are now making the move to the SEC. Oregon and Ole Miss rounded out the top five. 

What Michigan, Alabama and Washington, the CFP teams from last season that had coaching changes? The Crimson Tide are No. 6, the Wolverines are No. 9, and the Huskies, well, that is one of the surprises of this list. 

We used an inverse scoring method (awarding 25 points to a No. 1 selection, 24 for a No. 2 selection, all the way down to one point for a No. 25 selection) to determine the score for each school.

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Composite top 25 preseason college football rankings

A look at a composite Preseason Top 25 college football ranking across 11 major websites. Here is each school with the total points scored and their high and low ranking: 

RANKTEAMPOINTSHIGHLOW
1Georgia20011
2Ohio State19123
3Texas18324
4Oregon17735
5Ole Miss16156
6Alabama16049
7Notre Dame150510
8Missouri137712
9Michigan132712
10Penn State115817
11Florida State112720
12Utah106818
13LSU9510NR
14Tennessee931217
15Clemson871022
16Oklahoma84819
17Arizona5511NR
18(t)Oklahoma State561125
18(t)Kansas State5615NR
20NC State471224
21Kansas421723
22Miami2114NR
23USC2021NR
24Louisville1818NR
25Texas A&M1319NR

Others receiving votes: Washington 13, Virginia Tech 11, Iowa 7, SMU 4, West Virginia 4, Boise State 2, Memphis 1

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Composite Top 25 rankings by site

A look at those Preseason College Football Top 25 rankings shook out by the following sites: Sporting News, 247Sports.com, The Athletic, Athlon, CBS Sports, ESPN, Sports Illustrated and USA Today. 

SCHOOLSN24/7T-ATHATHLONCBSESPNSIUSA
Georgia11111111
Ohio State22222223
Texas33344332
Oregon44533444
Notre Dame5107108567
Ole Miss66666656
Florida State711101220111015
Michigan879712101211
Alabama95455785
LSU1013NR1110141613
Missouri1181297879
Penn State129178913916
Tennessee1312161316151317
Clemson1416221414161510
Utah15188151191412
Kansas State16NR151719172121
Arizona17NR132015201120
Oklahoma181519161318178
Oklahoma State1923111825191918
Louisville20251825NRNR22NR
USC2121NR23NR252322
Washington22NRNRNR18NR25NR
Kansas2317202121221819
NC State2420212424122014
Texas A&M2519232223NRNRNR
MiamiNR1414191724NRNR
SMUNRNRNRNR22NRNRNR
IowaNRNR24NRNR23NR24
Virginia TechNR2425NRNR21NR23
West VirginiaNR22NRNRNRNRNRNR
MemphisNRNRNRNRNRNRNR25
Boise StateNRNRNRNRNRNR24NR

Bill Bender

Bill Bender Photo

Bill Bender graduated from Ohio University in 2002 and started at The Sporting News as a fantasy football writer in 2007. He has covered the College Football Playoff, NBA Finals and World Series for SN. Bender enjoys story-telling, awesomely-bad 80s movies and coaching youth sports.