Predicting the first loss for every college football top 25 team

Predicting when each college football team ranked in the top 25 of the preseason Coaches’ Poll will suffer its first loss.

With the start of the 2017 college football regular season just days away, preseason polls and predictions are pouring in from across the nation.

The initial 2017 Coacthes’ Poll was released earlier in August, with the AP top 25 to follow on Monday morning. There are few surprises at the top of the preseason coaches’ poll, as power programs Alabama, Ohio State, Florida State and USC occupy the top four spots.

As talented as those respective rosters look on paper, every team in the country is capable of being beaten on any given Saturday. No team has gone undefeated in the College Football Playoff era, as previous champions Clemson, Alabama and Ohio State have even been prone to upsets in recent years.

Week one of the 2017 regular season will cause some shakeups in the rankings thanks to a number of huge non-conference matchups. Alabama-Florida State is the deserving headliner, but Michigan-Florida, West Virginia-Virginia Tech, and Tennessee-Georgia Tech are among the other games with important national implications.

College football promises plenty of chaos once again, which will likely render the preseason rankings useless soon enough. Here’s when each team ranked in the top 25 of the initial coaches’ poll will suffer its first defeat of the season.

No. 25 Utah Utes: at BYU, Sept. 9

Kyle Whittingham’s Utes have typically been good for eight plus wins a year and should hang around the top 25 for much of 2017, but face a tough road challenge in their second game of the season.

Utah finished the 2016 at campaign at 9-4 with a victory over USC and close losses to Washington and Colorado. Consistent defense and excellent special teams play have led the Utes to 28 victories over the past three years, and Utah figures to have another stingy front seven with Cody Barton and Filipo Mokofisi leading the way.

There are plenty of questions everywhere else, as Utah lost a ton of production from the skill positions and still have an open quarterback competition that includes 2016 starter Troy Williams and Alabama transfer Cooper Bateman. An inexperienced secondary could be the main concern, particularly with dynamic safety Chase Hansen out indefinitely with an undisclosed injury.

Following a warmup against North Dakota, the Utes will take on bitter rival BYU, which will be eager to end a six-game losing steak to Utah that included a dramatic missed two-point conversion in the dying seconds of the last meeting. Surviving a night game in Provo with all that turnover is a tall task, and the combination of a solid BYU offensive line and quarterback Tanner Mangum is enough to pick apart the new secondary if Hansen is still out.

The last four Holy Wars have been decided by one score, so don’t expect a blowout either way on Sept. 9. Utah is still in good shape to finish at least in the top three of the Pac-12 South, and will get a chance to upend Stanford at Rice-Eccles a few weeks later.