Poll Position: Ole Miss just outside Top 5 in preseason Coaches Poll
Fall camp is underway but the preseason might be officially started with the first poll being released on Monday in the form of the Coaches Poll and Ole Miss is sitting right where it was expected to be.
The Rebels are ranked No. 6 and are the fourth-highest Southeastern Conference team in the Top 10. This is the highest preseason ranking in the Coaches Poll since starting the 2009 season ranked No. 10.
Georgia was ranked No. 1 with Texas sitting at No. 4 followed by Alabama at No. 5. The other SEC newcomer, Oklahoma, enters the poll at No. 16.
Behind the Bulldogs is Ohio State at No. 2 then Oregon at No. 3 to round out the Top 5.
Defending national champion Michigan enters the first poll of the year at No. 8 and received one first place vote. The Rebels did not earn a first place vote.
Monday’s poll add credence to all the offseason and summer buzz that has followed Ole Miss since the Peach Bowl win last December, touting the program as a Top 5 program ahead of the 2024 campaign. The Associated Press preseason Top 25 will be released next Monday.
“I don’t deal a whole lot in expecting on things exactly to happen because it doesn’t really go that way,” Ole Miss head coach Lane Kiffin said last month. “It’s more just about the process of daily work with our players and getting better. I do think we have a really good collection of players that decided to return and had a chance to go to the pros. Then we were able to add some really intriguing portal pieces to that. But again, there’s a lot of work to do and all those expectations out there, those mean nothing.”
With a stacked roster full of returning players led by quarterback Jaxson Dart and a top transfer class headlined by defensive lineman Walter Nolen and Princely Umanmielen Ole Miss is set to make a College Football Playoff run for the first time since the CFP was formed in 2014.
Below is the full Preseason Coach Poll:
- Georgia
- Ohio State
- Oregon
- Texas
- Alabama
- Ole Miss
- Notre Dame
- Michigan
- Penn State
- Florida State
- Missouri
- LSU
- Utah
- Clemson
- Tennessee
- Oklahoma
- Kansas State
- Oklahoma State
- Miami
- Texas A&M
- Arizona
- North Carolina State
- Southern California
- Kansas
- Iowa
