For as long as there have been college football polls, there have been fans all too eager to complain about them. Some of that is unfair; ranking 25 teams from around the country on a weekly basis, with few (and often contradictory) data points at your disposal, is a far more difficult task than people assume. Sometimes, though, the AP voters give us good reason to scratch our heads.
Take this week's AP top 25 poll, which arrived on Tuesday afternoon following a holiday weekend jam-packed with football. There were some immediately obvious losers; both Michigan and Clemson dropped out of the rankings entirely, to the surprise of no one who watched them play on Saturday. But other teams that should have been punished more harshly instead skated by virtue of a soft opening schedule — including a few would-be title contenders. Who sticks out as overrated in the first real AP poll of the regular season? Let's dive in.
- Ohio State Buckeyes
- Georgia Bulldogs
- Notre Dame Fighting Irish
- Texas Longhorns
- Indiana Hoosiers
- Oregon Ducks
- Miami Hurricanes
- LSU Tigers
- Ole Miss Rebels
- Texas A&M Aggies
- Oklahoma Sooners
- Alabama Crimson Tide
- Texas Tech Red Raiders
- USC Trojans
- BYU Cougars
- Penn State Nittany Lions
- SMU Mustangs
- Tennessee Volunteers
- Washington Huskies
- Utah Utes
- Iowa Hawkeyes
- Houston Cougars
- Missouri Tigers
- Louisville Cardinals
- Virginia Cavaliers
The most overrated teams in the 2026 AP Top 25, Week 1
Indiana Hoosiers (No. 5)
Look, if you want to operate in a framework in which Indiana gets the benefit of the doubt as long as Curt Cignetti is around, I certainly don't blame you. And it's worth noting that the Hoosiers also got off to a sluggish start Week 1 last year, outlasting Old Dominion 27-14 before hitting the gas all the way to a national title.
But for as good as Cignetti is, and for as many firepower as the Hoosiers possess, this year's team is not last year's team. And the fact is that this year's Indiana kicked off its title defense by getting out-gained by North Texas in a game they only led by two scores entering the fourth quarter. Josh Hoover and this receiving corps were as advertised, but the Hoosiers couldn't run the ball a lick (Turbo Richard and Lee Beebe managed just 91 yards on 29 combined carries). And what was most alarming was just how pedestrian they looked defensively, allowing 5.5 yards per play to a UNT team that lost its entire offense from 2025.
In a vacuum, that's hardly worthy of moving up in this week's poll. Of course, we all know Cignetti's track record, but he has serious work to do.
Ole Miss Rebels (No. 9)
When Trinidad Chambliss is firing darts and running all over the place and generally being a superhero, we know the Rebels can play with anybody. But after a narrow escape against Louisville on Sunday night, there are questions just about everywhere else for Pete Golding's team — especially a defense that got shredded through the air by Lincoln Kienholz.
Ole Miss had a tough time getting stops consistently against good competition last season, which ultimately led to its undoing against Miami in the College Football Playoff semifinal. After one week, it sure doesn't seem like Golding found any improvements over the offseason. And while Chambliss might be able to make up for that for a while, it's a whole lot to ask of your quarterback — and it raises serious doubts about whether this can really be a top-10 team once SEC play begins.
Texas Tech Red Raiders (No. 13)
One of the most low-key surprising results of the weekend came in Lubbock, where a Texas Tech team with national title aspirations had to slog through a 33-10 win over FCS Abilene Christian.
Will Hammond and a brand-new receiving corps was efficient but struggled to push the ball vertically, while the Red Raiders also couldn't really impose their will on the ground. The defense was workmanlike, but this hardly looked like a team dynamic enough to run roughshod through its conference the way it did last year. The Brendan Sorsby saga masked just how much Tech had to turn over from last year's Playoff team, and we didn't get anything like a resounding answer in Week 1. Reputation and inertia is really the only reason why this team is in the top 15 at the moment.
SMU Mustangs (No. 17)
Monday's outage-delayed win over Florida State was pretty much the Kevin Jennings era at SMU in microcosm. Rhett Lashlee's team moved the ball at will, averaging nearly nine yards per play on the night and outgaining the Noles by some 260 yards ... and yet they needed a field goal at the gun to escape Tallahassee with a win thanks to four turnovers, including a couple of brutal picks from Jennings.
Such is life with one of the most high-variance quarterbacks in the country. If you want to focus on the positives, this offense has a sky-high ceiling when it's clicking. Then again, having to survive Florida State in the ashes of the Mike Norvell era hardly counts for much, and certainly doesn't warrant moving up two spots in the polls. It just feels like SMU makes too many mistakes to be taken seriously as a Playoff contender.
Washington Huskies (No. 19)
Given the extreme overhaul Washington State went through amid a coaching change this offseason, and the continuity Washington has on both sides of the ball, the Huskies were expected to have no problems in the Apple Cup on Sunday. But it was a slog throughout, as Jedd Fisch's team had just 10 points through three quarters and struggled to put their in-state rivals away until the final minutes.
Yes, UW did move down two spots in this week's poll. But what evidence do we have that this is a top-20 team at the moment? Demond Williams is a ton of fun, but these are the same Huskies that beat up on bad competition and had nothing to offer the good teams on their schedule last season. Nine months later, it looks like not a whole lot has changed.
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