After Texas's second-half collapse in the Red River Rivalry and Georgia's rain-soaked heavyweight win in Tuscaloosa, there is a new order of power at the top of the 2026 college football rankings. The Bulldogs landed enough punches in a controversial and contentious bout with Alabama, getting a leg up on their fellow SEC title hopefuls and putting together the best argument as the best team in the country. With an average ballot ranking of 1.2, Georgia is not a totally unanimous No. 1 among our voters, who are experts from CBS Sports and 247Sports, but it shows a fairly broad consensus that Kirby Smart's group starts the second-half conversation for the national title race this season.
Miami checks in at No. 2, carrying a fairly solid rating of 2.2, which suggests some of that first-place love could be going the Hurricanes' way, just ahead of Notre Dame at No. 3 with an average ballot ranking of 3.3. Those three teams represent a Tier 1 in our rankings, with a slight drop before the run of Ohio State, Indiana and Alabama that starts at No. 4 and sits firmly above another cut line just behind No. 6. Further down in the rankings, you see a large clustering of teams between No. 14 and No. 22, as our voters don't see a ton of separation yet between those power conference teams who have yet to pile up multiple losses, and plenty of shake-ups for teams moving up and down beyond the top 25.
We have isolated some of the bigger and more notable changes to the CBS Sports 138 in the Mover's Report, which you can find below the top 25 table. College football experts from CBS Sports and 247Sports submit ballots each week, which are averaged to produce our rankings. You can see the top 25 below and 26-138 on our rankings page.
Check out the rest of the CBS Sports 138: Teams ranked 26-138
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