It's very much the dead period for college football and that means a ton of preseason polls will be coming out and college football experts will be making their lists. Sports Illustrated's Stewart Mandel was on the Finebaum Show and and gave his own top 25 list. The top five was missing a pretty noticeable title contender this year:
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Mandel had Florida State at No. 7 behind Clemson and Penn State. The Seminoles are widely believed to be the best team in the ACC heading into this season even with the loss of running back Dalvin Cook. Quarterback Deondre Francois is expected to break out and will be even better than last year with a better offensive line to protect him and several five-star running backs entering the fray.
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The fact that Clemson is ahead of them seems a bit ridiculous as well considering the Tigers lost a Heisman finalist in quarterback Deshaun Watson and a workhorse running back in Wayne Gallman. They will also have to replace top receiver Mike Williams who went high in the NFL Draft.
The rest of the top ten features Oklahoma, Auburn and Oklahoma State with Washington getting the nod right over FSU. The other 15 schools in the top 25 are your typical teams like Florida, Michigan, LSU, Georgia and Mississippi State among others.
