Blogpoll 2026 Week 3: We’re starting to get an idea what this season is about

Not a lot of movement this week despite the Game of the Century

Welcome to Week 3 of the 2026 Blogpoll. There were some big (and biggish) games this weekend, and we were able to start sorting out who’s real, who’s on the cusp of fraud status, as well as the general identity and tenor of the season. And it’s coming up “SEC” on most rolls of the die.

The Blog Poll is not a power poll. It is not biased by preseason polls (to the extent that I can manage). The criteria are nebulous, far-ranging, and capricious — strength of schedule, bad and good coaching, injuries, exigent circumstances, home/away results, defense or lack thereof, offense or lack thereof, line play, power poll-ishness, can you cover a spread. (Vegas is pretty smart about how good a team is), head-to-head where possible or prudent, and my own lying eyeballs. Who you beat has to matter the most at the end of the day, and who you lose to is relevant to the extent a tiebreaker is required among several candidates. Earlier polls lacking data points are obviously more fluid than later ones.

On to Week three. Notes to follow.

The Top 10 sees very little movement, aside from A&M and LSU dropping out. In the case of the Tigers, their fall was not quite so precipitous as the Aggies. LSU is still a dangerous team with a lot of weapons; they simply got beaten by a better team on Saturday night. In the case of Texas A&M, they took a major plunge in the rankings: Not only has Marcel Reed not improved, but the secondary was vulnerable all day, and the Wildcats repeatedly punished them up the middle on the ground. For a team that wants to win along the lines, the Ags were dominated there.

Kentucky, Florida, and Mississippi State all make their debut in the Blogpoll this week, all three on the heels of important conference road games, and where all three shined. That UA/MSU game in Starkville is looking a mighty bit dangerous now beyond merely representing “trap game” talking points. That’s especially true if the Alabama secondary we saw on Saturday makes an appearance against the Bulldogs — they’ll lose. But, the cream of the crop (at least for now), are the Georgia Bulldogs and Texas Longhorns. Though, this weekend we do get one elimination game when A&M travels to Baton Rouge, and another game to sort out pecking order, as the Ole Miss Rebels hit the road for the Swamp in a battle of unbeatens.

I think there are some decent, even good, teams in the Big 12: Houston, Utah, BYU, Cincy among them. But we cannot justify raising Texas Tech any higher than this after being gifted a win by the stripes at home, and with a schedule that saw them play their one and only ranked opponent last Thursday. Gross. Steve Sarkisian needs to get on their ass again. That’s simply pitiful.

That said, it’s not much different than the Big 10, where Indiana doesn’t play a ranked team for another month (and that’s counting on USC and Michigan being ranked), and which has a schedule where its opponents have one combined win. Like the Red Raiders, this team just doesn’t look like itself from last year. Unlike the Red Raiders, they’re actually playing defense. The whole conference if full of enigmas though. Do we think undefeated Northwestern, Nebraska, or Michigan are good? How is it possible for Penn State to change coaches and still look like Penn State? Is UCLA actually as good as they’ve looked? While we’re learning much about the rest of the country, owing to shameful scheduling we still know almost nothing about this league, other than Ohio State is really talented and will be in the playoffs.

The ACC is a bit easier to sort out (for a change). It’s Miami, then everyone else. Though perhaps the gap isn’t quite so large as we once imagined. The Hurricanes have far more talent than almost anyone in the country, so they’ll always win that battle. But they didn’t look so crisp on the road against Wake, the first Power 4 team they’ve faced. Now, imagine a game against an actually talented team — someone like Louisville in the ACCCG. There’s a reason Cristobal hitting the road terrifies ‘Canes fans. Miami also has to stare down Notre Dame, in the marquee matchup for both. Duke is looking dangerous down there, and it doesn’t appear as though Virginia has gone anywhere either.

And pulling up the G5 train are the last men standing (for now), the James Madison Dukes, who keep losing coaches, keep losing players, and keep winning impressively — this week’s effort? Crossing the country to San Diego, shutting down the Aztecs, and winning by three scores. Just a thoroughly impressive program.

That’s it for now. We’ll be back next week after a very eventful week in the SEC especially.