Alabama are USA Today’s coaches poll No. 1. How many preseason No. 1 teams have won the National Title?
The Alabama Crimson Tide are preseason No. 1 team in college football by the USA Today coaches poll for a second year. Does that mean a title is on the way?
USA Today’s coaches poll was released on Monday afternoon and the defending champion University of Georgia Bulldogs were not named the preseason No. 1. It’s the Alabama Crimson Tide who have been voted the best team coming into the season.
Bama is back on top
The Bulldogs may have got the best of the Crimson Tide in last year’s College Football Playoff title game, but Bama will start this season in pole position.
Nick Saban and the Crimson Tide have dominated college football since the head ball coach took over in 2007. Saban has built a perennial powerhouse in Tuscaloosa, leading Bama to six National Titles and 10 SEC Championships.
The Top 25 polls are released on a weekly basis after the 62 Division I FBS head coaches that make up the Amway Board of Coaches put in their submissions. A first place vote counts for 25 points and a 25th place vote counts for one point. The team that has the most total points at the end of voting is ranked No. 1.
Saban looking to add to legacy in Tuscaloosa
The Crimson Tide are a good bet to be ranked one overall coming into pretty much every season, at least in the last 15 years. Nick Saban and the Crimson Tide are used to playing the season with the bullseye on their back. Of the nine total times that Alabama has been named the preseason No. 1, seven of them have come in the last 12 years.
It’s never a bad thing to be named the No. 1 team in the country, but Bama hasn’t faired too well after being the coaches top team coming into the season. They have won the national title just twice when topping the preseason polls, with the first coming in 1978 and the last coming in 2017.
Since the coaches poll came out in 1950 there have been 11 teams that have been crowned kings of college football.
- 2007: Alabama
- 2004: USC
- 1999: Florida State
- 1993: Florida State
- 1985: Oklahoma
- 1978: Alabama
- 1975 Oklahoma
- 1974: Oklahoma
- 1956: Oklahoma
- 1952: MIchigan State
- 1951: Tennessee
Defending champs ranked No. 3
There is only one team that has been named the preseason’s top team in the nation more than Alabama. The Oklahoma Sooners have earned that distinction ten times and went on to win it all four times. The Sooners dominated the preseason polls in the 70s and 80, but the Sooners haven’t had the pleasure since 2011.
The defending national champions Georgia Bulldogs come into the season ranked third in the USA Today coaches poll.