The last couple of years, I have I put up a poll for everyone to pick who would win each conference game during the year. I found these results fascinating prior to the year. When you vote in the poll, it tabulates the current % of votes for each team in each individual game. Here are the results of the fan poll from 2009.

When initially reviewing the results I was quite impressed with the accuracy as you the fans did quite well in numerous conferences. In fact, when I calculated the results (similar to what stassen.com does for all the major preseason college football magazines) you guys finished #1!!!! Check out my June 10 Blog for more details.

Here are the current conference standings for the SEC, Big 10, Big 12, ACC, Pac-10, Big East and MWC with the percentages of each game factored in according to your votes.

According to your votes Defending champ Alabama is predicted to go undefeated in the regular season for the 3rd year in a row. (Georgia was the last SEC team to do so back in 1980-82 playing a six game schedule). The Crimson Tide's closest game is expected to come against in-state rival Auburn as they received 64% of the vote. According to you, Auburn will start 6-0 in the SEC before dropping their last two. Also Arkansas and LSU right now are in a dead heat to finish 3rd in the West. In the East, Florida is expected to win all of their games except their road trip to Alabama as the Gators will look to make it three straight SEC East titles. Georgia also is expected to go 7-1 but just 40% of you so far expect them to beat Florida. Tennessee with a tough opening schedule is expected to start 0-5 before winning their final three.

Ohio St is expected to go through the conference unscathed and this would be their sixth straight shared or outright Big Ten title. Their closest games are expected to be their road trips to Wisconsin (67%) and Iowa (67%). Iowa gets the nod for 2nd place over Wisconsin (67%) and according to you should win most of their games comfortably with only the Penn St and Wisconsin games coming under 75%. Wisconsin and Penn St do not play each other this year and the Badgers and Nittany Lions are expected to tie for 3rd.

Like my magazine you are predicting the Sooners and Cornhuskers to run the table in the regular season and meet up in the Big 12 title game. Texas is the biggest obstacle for both teams but 74% of you expect Oklahoma to win the Red River Rivalry and 65% of you expect Nebraska to beat the Longhorns at home. Texas A&M looks to have their best conference finish in many years according to you with losses coming only to conference heavyweights Oklahoma, Texas and Nebraska. It is interesting to see four Big 12 South teams with 5-3 or better overall records while only one team in the Big 12 North is expected to finish above .500. Naturally this shows that the South is without question the stronger division in the league.

According to you, Florida St will win the ACC Atlantic with their only loss coming to Miami. So far the Seminoles look like clear winners in all the other games (90%+) with the exception of a home game against North Carolina (57%). Despite being picked to win at Boston College, Clemson is in 3rd with their tough schedule that includes predicted losses to ACC Coastal teams Miami, North Carolina and Georgia Tech. Meanwhile Boston College only gets one of the four possible Top 25 teams from the Coastal in Virginia Tech and get the nod at 5-3. In the Coastal, the Hokies are heavy favorites in most of their games with only Miami (60%) and North Carolina (65%) coming under 84%. Miami is picked to go 7-1 while North Carolina and Georgia Tech are picked to finish 5-3 in the conference. It is interesting to see that you have both Virginia and NC State going 0-8 in the conference.

The Pac-10 was the toughest conference for me to forecast this year as there is very little difference between the top 9 teams. So far your voting tallies agree with my “toughest conference to forecast” assessment as you have several tight races between conference favorites. Even though USC is picked to finish a perfect 9-0, five of their games are in the 50-60% range which means they could go either way. Defending champ Oregon is picked to go 8-1 with only two of their games coming under 69%. Stanford is picked 3rd with a 6-3 overall mark while Arizona, Oregon St and Washington are all picked to finish at 5-4.

The Big East also figures to be very competitive this year and so far your votes reflect that. Right now you favor Pittsburgh to finish the conference season unscathed with West Virginia coming in at #2 with a 6-1 mark. Cincinnati, USF and Connecticut all finished at 4-3 with the Bearcats coming close to 5-2 (49% at Connecticut).

This conference has been dominated by Utah, BYU and TCU (Air Force a clear #4) in the past several years and this year looks no different. Right now you have Utah barely edging out defending champ TCU (52-48%). TCU despite the projected loss to Utah looks to be a heavy favorite in the other seven games with a 90%+ vote in each. BYU is projected to go 6-2 while Air Force is 5-3 with annual wins against all the conference teams outside of the Big Three.

In the next day I will add the rest of the conferences' current results in and in two weeks I will give you an updated look at the standings for all of the conferences. If you have not voted already, On the PhilSteele.com homepage below the FCS countdown, select a conference of your choice. After clicking on the conference you get the complete conference schedule for each team with the home team capitalized. All you have to do is vote on who you will think the winner will be in each game and the current voting tally appears. Remember you can only vote once and take your time by maybe doing one conference at a time. To vote you do have to register your e-mail address and then login but this is just to make sure there is no stuffing of the ballot box. Have a great time voting and thanks in advance!

Only 51 Days Away Until the 1st College Football Game!!!