| Daily Blog • August 18, 2014 |
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10 for 10 (100%) Six Months In Advance!!!
College Football fans wait several months for the AP/Coaches preseason polls to come out in early August and buy several of the preseason magazines including mine. Naturally I have always found these polls to be interesting and for the last several years I have projected the preseason AP Top 10 prior to the season and have hit on at least 9 of the 10 teams each year! In the past couple of years I have expanded my projection to 25 teams and yesterday with the AP Poll being released I thought it would be a good time to analyze how I did six months ago with my prediction.
First, way back on February 3, I put out my projected preseason AP Top 10, I mentioned it numerous times that this was NOT MY preseason Top 10 for next year, but it is where I project the AP Top 10 to come out at the start of the season. I then did an expanded projection of the AP Top 25 on April 8.
First, for the 6th consecutive season, I had at least 9 of the Top 10 AP teams projected and actually went 10 for 10 for the second time in three years giving me a 6-year total of 56 of 60 (93%). As far as poll position goes, I projected 5 of the Top 10 teams at their exact spot and of the Top 13 teams in the poll, only Auburn was off more than one spot (I projected #4 and they were #6).
In 2012 and 2013, I hit a perfect 25 for 25 with my AP Top 25 projection and this year was extremely disappointed to only hit 22 of 25 (88%). The three teams that beat my projection were Arizona St, Kansas St and Nebraska as I had Texas, UCF and Louisville all in their place.
Other than those teams mentioned above, some noteworthy moves since my projection are Missouri, who I projected to be #18 in April was #24 in the AP Poll and my preseason college football magazine might have had something to do with that as I had the Tigers #41.
You can now see that there is really no need to wait those agonizing five months prior to the season to see if your team will be ranked in the preseason Top 10/25…just make sure you are checking out my blog in early Spring for my projected AP Top 25!
Top 10 Results (10 for 10!!!)
| TEAM | My Projection February 3 |
Actual AP Poll August 17 |
Diff |
| Florida State | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| Alabama | 2 | 2 | 0 |
| Oregon | 3 | 3 | 0 |
| Oklahoma | 5 | 4 | 1 |
| Ohio State | 6 | 5 | 1 |
| Auburn | 4 | 6 | -2 |
| UCLA | 7 | 7 | 0 |
| Michigan State | 8 | 8 | 0 |
| South Carolina | 10 | 9 | 1 |
| Baylor | 9 | 10 | -1 |
Top 25 Results
| TEAM | My Projection April 8 |
Actual AP Poll August 17 |
Diff |
| Florida State | 1 | 1 | 0 |
| Alabama | 2 | 2 | 0 |
| Oregon | 3 | 3 | 0 |
| Oklahoma | 5 | 4 | 1 |
| Ohio State | 6 | 5 | 1 |
| Auburn | 4 | 6 | -2 |
| UCLA | 7 | 7 | 0 |
| Michigan State | 8 | 8 | 0 |
| South Carolina | 10 | 9 | 1 |
| Baylor | 9 | 10 | -1 |
| Stanford | 12 | 11 | 1 |
| Georgia | 11 | 12 | -1 |
| LSU | 13 | 13 | 0 |
| Wisconsin | 17 | 14 | 3 |
| USC | 14 | 15 | -1 |
| Clemson | 16 | 16 | 0 |
| Notre Dame | 15 | 17 | -2 |
| Ole Miss | 20 | 18 | 2 |
| Arizona State | 19 | -19 | |
| Kansas State | 20 | -20 | |
| Texas A&M | 19 | 21 | -2 |
| Nebraska | 22 | -22 | |
| North Carolina | 23 | 23 | 0 |
| Missouri | 18 | 24 | -6 |
| Washington | 22 | 25 | -3 |