The 7 College Football Teams That Have Started The Season Ranked At #1 More Than Any Others

Starting the college football season at the top of the AP Poll doesn’t guarantee you’ll finish there, but it’s a sign you have a good reason to be optimistic heading into the season. Most teams have never secured the top spot in the preseason, but there are others that have landed there on more than a few occasions.

No college football teams have started the season at #1 in the AP Poll more times than these programs

As of the start of the 2026 college football season, there are 138 teams competing at the FBS level. However, there are only 24 schools that have managed to earn the top spot when it comes to the preseason poll the Associated Press has released every year since 1950.

11 of those teams (Auburn, Iowa, LSU, Michigan State, Penn State, Pitt, Purdue, Syracuse, Tennessee, Texas, and UCLA) have only managed to check that box a single time, while others have had a handful of appearances at the top.

There are also 11 teams that have started the season at #1 and finished as the kings of college football, and you probably won’t be shocked to learn most of those programs also represent the schools that have kicked things off at the top the most times over the decades (these stats come courtesy of the College Poll Archive).

7. Notre Dame: 5

• 1950 (finished unranked)
• 1953 (#2)
• 1954 (#4)
• 1967 (#5)
• 1971 (#13)

Notre Dame has a reputation for being overhyped (and overranked) due to its former status as a college football juggernaut. The Fighting Irish claim 11 national championships, but seven of them were secured prior to 1950 and the current drought stretches back to 1988.

The school has waited even longer to reclaim the top spot in the AP Poll at the start of the season, as 2026 marks the 55th year since its last time there (Notre Dame has also never been able to finish at #1 after starting there).

6. Nebraska: 6

• 1965 (#5)
• 1972 (#4)
• 1976 (#9)
• 1983 (#2)
• 1996 (#6)
• 2000 (#8)

Nebraska has turned into a shell of its former self since the mid-2010s, and Cornhuskers fans had become accustomed to sustained success when you consider they earned the #1 spot in the preseason at least one time in five consecutive decades.

However, as was the case with Notre Dame, they fell short of the top spot at the end of the year every single time they began there.

5. Florida State: 6

• 1988 (#3)
• 1991 (#4)
• 1993 (#1)
• 1995 (#4)
• 1999 (#1)
• 2014 (#5)

Florida State had to wait a while to head into the season at #1, but Bobby Bowden was finally able to get them there for the first time in 1988.

Both of the titles he won during his time with the Seminoles saw them live up to the hype after they started the preseason at the top of the poll, and the squad that won a title in 1999 is just one of two teams that started at #1 and stayed there every single week until the end.

The other school?

4. USC: 7

• 1963 (unranked)
• 1973 (#8)
• 1979 (#2)
• 2004 (#1)
• 2005 (#2)
• 2007 (#3)
• 2012 (unranked)

USC has the dubious distinction of being the only team in the country that has finished unranked on multiple occasions after starting at #1; the Trojans ended up going 7-3 in 1963 and 7-6 and 2012.

Pete Carroll was the head coach of a team that started at #1 in three of the nine seasons he spent at the helm, and the one that won it all in 2004 joined Florida State as the only one to go wire-to-wire after beating Oklahoma in the national championship.

T-2. Alabama: 9

• 1966 (#3)
• 1978 (#1)
• 2010 (#10)
• 2013 (#7)
• 2016 (#2)
• 2017 (#1)
• 2018 (#2)
• 2021 (#2)
• 2022 (#5)

Alabama’s appearances at the top of the AP Poll are a tale of two legendary coaches: Bear Bryant and Nick Saban, although the latter is firmly responsible for the lion’s share.

Bryant led the Crimson Tide to six national championships during his storied tenure in Tuscaloosa, but the 1978 season was the only time they secured one after starting at #1.

Saban, on the other hand, commanded a team that was positioned as the one to beat seven times during his 17 seasons at Alabama, and in 2018, they became the second school in the history of the AP Poll to earn that honor three years in a row.

However, 2017 was the only time one of those teams ended up with a title.

T-2. Ohio State: 9

• 1958 (#8)
• 1962 (unranked)
• 1969 (#4)
• 1970 (#5)
• 1980 (#15)
• 1998 (#2)
• 2006 (#2)
• 2015 (#4)

There isn’t a single team that’s a better paragon of sustained success on this particular front than Ohio State. The Buckeyes earned the top spot in the preseason poll in 2026, which marked the eighth consecutive decade in which they’ve started there at least one time.

However, it’s also been a bit of a curse, as none of the nine national championships the school claims came during a season they kicked off at #1.

1. Oklahoma: 10

• 1956 (#1)
• 1957 (#4)
• 1974 (#1)
• 1975 (#1)
• 1977 (#7)
• 1985 (#1)
• 1986 (#3)
• 1987 (#3)
• 2003 (#3)
• 2011 (#16)

Last, and certainly not least, we have Oklahoma, which serves as the antidote to Ohio State thanks to its ability to avoid being snakebitten after starting the season with a target on its back. The Sooners have won seven national championships, and four of those titles were in years they started at #1.

With that said, Oklahoma has had a bit of trouble avoiding that fate since the 1980s, which is the decade when it became the first team in the history of the AP Poll to start at #1 three seasons in a row.