FRISCO, Texas — Preseason polls are not supposed to have a bearing on how the College Football Playoff Selection Committee ranks teams later in the season. Still, the Big 12 is taking extra care to make sure the CFP doesn’t have additional ammunition to use against the conference later this season.
In a surprising move before the 30th year of the conference’s existence, administrators and coaches opted to discontinue the media’s annual preseason poll. Their unanimous approval in a vote conducted earlier this summer was straightforward: significant roster turnover due to the transfer portal often leads to preseason polls painting an inaccurate picture of teams, and increasing parity in the Big 12 has allowed for wild, worst-to-first finishes, which usually hinder a rise in the national polls.
“We were adamant as coaches to our athletic directors that we have to get rid of this because the narrative is so poor,” Kansas State coach Chris Klieman told CBS Sports.
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Carter Bahns
Last season, that team was Arizona State. The Sun Devils were picked by the media to finish last — 16th — in the Big 12 but wound up winning the conference title and clinching a berth in the CFP with a No. 12 ranking. ASU finished with 11 wins but didn’t appear in the national polls until Week 12, the third week of the CFP’s rankings. In 2021, Baylor was picked third-to-last in the conference but went on to win the Big 12 title and finished No. 7 in the polls after winning the Sugar Bowl.
“I think it hurt Arizona State last year,” Big 12 commissioner Brett Yormark told CBS Sports. “It set an expectation. So then, when you’re in that room, whether it’s the selection process or not, how do you rank a team that was ranked 16th in their own conference? Whether you can see beyond that or not, I don’t know; I can’t speak for anyone. But we just felt that it could have disadvantaged Arizona State.”
Making the connection that preseason polls influence how the 13-person selection committee votes when it begins its process in November is a challenging ask. Still, the CFP’s top 25 often mirrors the AP Top 25 and Coaches polls late in the season. Early in the season, the AP and Coaches polls often remix the same segment of teams despite early losses, often slowly falling before being taken out of the top 25. Take Florida State last season, which began the year ranked No. 10 but finished unranked with only three wins. On the other hand, four unranked teams in the preseason made it to the CFP: Arizona State, Boise State, Indiana and SMU.
“It is hard to put sun blockers on, but we encourage and require our committee members to do that. They’re all professionals,” CFP executive director Rich Clark said. “They’re all committed to this, so they’re going to do the right thing. They’re going to take every piece of information, whether it’s data, what they see on the field, what they hear from the conferences — they get feedback from the conferences as well — they’re going to take all that into consideration.
“What other polls do, they may hear it or see it, but that’s just another point they may or may not consider.”
The Big 12’s crusade to change the narrative might not be done. Klieman revealed to CBS Sports he is privately advocating for the abolition of preseason voting in the AP and Coaches polls, a practice that began in 1950. He said conversations are underway among coaches in the Big 12 and the American Football Coaches Association.
“I don’t think we’ll get it done right now,” he said. “We’re trying to push. When the CFP comes out, that’s when the first AP and USA Today poll should come out,.The narrative tells you everything, and unfortunately, that’s not great for the Big 12. It’s probably not great for the ACC. You know, it’s just not.”
Klieman said he informed AFCA President Craig Bohl this summer he will not participate as a voter in the Coaches Poll. Bohl declined comment when reached Tuesday by CBS Sports.
Cincinnati coach Scott Satterfield previously coached Appalachian State to three 10-win seasons, but the program did not finish in the top 25. He didn’t support preseason polls in the early 2010s, and his opinion hasn’t changed now that he’s in a power conference.
“It’s even more true now because of the turnover. Everybody’s got a minimum of 40 new players,” he said. “How can anybody know how they’re going to be this year? You don’t know.”
Arizona State coach Kenny Dillingham said he remains unbothered by preconceived notions but understands the argument.
“I do think there’s validity to that, but on the same token, sports are about controversy,” Dillingham told CBS Sports. “How do you have controversy if people don’t pick polls? There’s gonna be a poll. We can’t stop it.”
Dillingham’s words might as well have been attributed to the AP poll’s father. Alan Gould, a former AP editor, launched the poll in 1936, revealing in 1985 he did it to “develop interest and controversy between football Saturdays.”
“Papers wanted material to fill space between games,” he told the AP at the time. “That’s all I had in mind, something to keep the pot boiling. Sports then was living off controversy, opinion, whatever. This was just another exercise in hoopla.”
Not much has changed over the last 40 years.
College football has never lacked controversy, even within its own ranks. The major conferences raised concerns earlier this year about the CFP Selection Committee, with some athletic directors suggesting that power be removed from the 13-member committee. The SEC believed it deserved more teams in the playoff after three, three-loss teams were left just outside the field. The CFP has since developed new metrics to better weigh teams’ strength of schedule, which will inform the committee’s decisions starting this fall.
Meanwhile, commissioners continue to debate whether to expand the format from 12 teams to as many as 16. One possibility includes as many as four automatic qualifiers from the Big Ten and SEC, which would further reduce the committee’s control as conference standings carry more weight.
“I mean, how does the NFL do it?” said BYU coach Kalani Sitake. “They just play the games and let the standings speak for themselves.”
The Big 12 is betting on a deep conference with parity, led by nine quarterbacks who threw for more than 2,400 yards last season, changing the narrative. The conference has never had more than one representative in the CFP.
“I fully expect the Big 12 to earn multiple College Football Playoff bids this year and to show once again that we can compete,” Yormark said.
Whether the tweaks to the CFP’s metrics lead to disparity between its top 25 and the media and coaches’ polls won’t be known until November. Until then, the preseason polls will tide us over and drum up more theories — but just don’t count on the Big 12 taking part.
“I would hope that preconceived notions don’t affect it when it matters,” said Scott Frost, who led UCF to an undefeated season in which the school claimed itself the national champion in 2017. “But we live in America. This a show, too. We’re entertainers, people like to watch and people like to make predictions.”
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