College Football Rankings Week 11: CFN Top 25 After the Saturday Storm

The matchups on Saturday were as strong as college football had seen in a long, long time. Ten of the top 14 teams in the first College Football Playoff rankings were either playing each other or someone else in the top 25. This was going to be a true Showdown, Shakeout, or whatever you want to call it Saturday, and it was absolutely that.
Several teams stepped up and looked the part of true players in their respective conference races and the national title hunt, and others politely tapped out of the 2026 season. It’s all reflected in the latest CFN Top 25.

2026 College Football Rankings: CFN’s Top 25 for Week 11

25. Minnesota Golden Gophers

Record: (5-4)
Last Week Rank: 26
Week 10: UCLA 34, Minnesota 20
Up Next: at Penn State
Don’t let the final score fool you. Minnesota hung in there with one of the two unbeaten teams left in college football, only to buckle late. That 13-10 win over Iowa from a few weeks ago is still fresh, as is the 23-10 close call against Indiana. However, the Gophers have to beat Penn State next week to stay in the top 25.

24. Wisconsin Badgers

Record: (6-3)
Last Week Rank: 23
Week 10: Wisconsin 31, Rutgers 10
Up Next: at Maryland
Yeah, yeah, yeah, Rutgers, whatever, but the Badgers pulled off the blowout with a freshman quarterback making his debut. The 24-7 win over USC puts Wisconsin here, along with the good fight against UCLA. The blowout against Michigan State suddenly seems decent.

23 Wake Forest Demon Deacons

Record: (8-1)
Last Week Rank: 22
Week 10: Wake Forest 77, Merrimack 0
Up Next: at SMU
Okay, Demon Deacons, you had your fun against the FCS team. Now, it’s on. An ACC title appearance is there for the taking, but the showdown at SMU this week will make or break the season.

22. Ohio State Buckeyes

Record: (6-3)
Last Week Rank: 15
Week 10: Oregon 41, Ohio State 28
Up Next: Northwestern
That was embarrassing against the Ducks. The Buckeyes are still the only team to beat Indiana. They destroyed Illinois and Iowa, and that seems like 50 years ago now after getting rolled by USC and Oregon. The defense has gone bye-bye.

21. Houston Cougars

Record: (7-2)
Last Week Rank: 24
Week 10: Houston 31, Cincinnati 24
Up Next: at Colorado
We should be giving the Cougars more respect than this. The only losses were in tight battles against Texas Tech and Utah, and the wins over Oklahoma State and Cincinnati are terrific.

20. USC Trojans

Record: (7-2)
Last Week Rank: 20
Week 10: OPEN DATE
Up Next: at Indiana
Don’t look now, but USC is suddenly one of the few Big Ten teams left with a shot at making the College Football Playoff. Credit is still given for the win over Ohio State, and the loss to Oregon doesn’t seem so horrible now. Beat Indiana in Bloomington next week, and here we go.

19. Oregon Ducks

Record: (6-3)
Last Week Rank: 25
Week 10: Oregon 41, Ohio State 28
Up Next: Michigan
The 21-10 loss at Illinois a few weeks ago is super-puzzling, but it also appeared to be freeing. The Ducks played Ohio State like there weren’t any f… fudges to give. Those were the Ducks we’ve been waiting for all year, and now there’s a real shot to go 9-3 and make a ton of noise if they can keep this going.

18. Arizona Wildcats

Record: (7-2)
Last Week Rank: 19
Week 10: Arizona 29, TCU 28
Up Next: Utah
It took a mega-miracle to get by TCU, but any landing you can walk away from is a good one. The Wildcats have two losses – at BYU, and at Texas Tech. Those were on the road. The Utah game next week isn’t. Show us you’re for real, Arizona.

17. Missouri Tigers

Record: (6-3)
Last Week Rank: 17
Week 10: Texas 34, Missouri 20
Up Next: at Georgia
This isn’t really a rip, but the loss to Texas was Missouri being Missouri. A good, solid team that can occasionally be terrific, but it’s missing that one extra gear to be special. The Longhorns are really that good, though. So is the next opponent: Georgia.

16. Iowa Hawkeyes

Record: (7-2)
Last Week Rank: 16
Week 10: Iowa 24, Northwestern 10
Up Next: Purdue
This is still Iowa, but it has a more explosive passing element in its mix. Chalk up the loss to Minnesota a few weeks ago to life on the road in the Big Ten rivalry game, and the other loss was to Ohio State, before it all went so terribly wrong. It would be nice to have a strong win on the résumé, but get by Purdue, at Illinois, and Nebraska, and demand to be in the CFP.

15. LSU Tigers

Record: (6-3)
Last Week Rank: 10
Week 10: Alabama 31, LSU 13
Up Next: Texas
Oooooooof. Okay, so LSU isn’t ready to have nice things, but it’s still dangerous and talented. This can get bad in a hurry with a trip to Tennessee after facing Texas next week.

14. Ole Miss Rebels

Record: (6-3)
Last Week Rank: 9
Week 10: Georgia 42, Ole Miss 7
Up Next: at Oklahoma
The Rebels get a little bit of a break here. Georgia turned a corner last week, and now it’s playing like the best team in America. However, there are no excuses when it comes to next week’s game at Oklahoma. Win that, finish 9-3. (Wofford and Mississippi State close things out.)

13. Texas Tech Red Raiders

Record: (8-1)
Last Week Rank: 18
Week 10: Texas Tech 53, West Virginia 48
Up Next: at Oklahoma State
If you didn’t stay up to watch the fantastic fireworks show, the win over West Virginia showed toughness and grit. The Red Raiders kept getting hammered by adversity, and they kept on overcoming it. There’s more offensive fun where that came from, with trips to Oklahoma State and Baylor next.

12. South Carolina Gamecocks

Record: (6-3)
Last Week Rank: 11
Week 10: South Carolina 17, Texas A&M 9
Up Next: at Arkansas
You want to talk about grinding out wins, South Carolina keeps doing that. This week it was in a dogfight with a Texas A&M team that balled out hard defensively. Now the Gamecocks are on a four-game winning streak, including wins over Tennessee and Florida.

11. Indiana Hoosiers

Record: (8-1)
Last Week Rank: 14
Week 10: OPEN DATE
Up Next: USC
Part of the job of doing rankings is to go back and figure out what was real and what wasn’t. At this point, the loss to Ohio State is still fine – and it always will be – but there’s just nothing meaty on the schedule bone. But beating Minnesota, Michigan, and Northwestern is still good. The struggles it took to pull those off are the problem.

10. Kentucky Wildcats

Record: (7-2)
Last Week Rank: 7
Week 10: Tennessee 34, Kentucky 6
Up Next: Florida
Tennessee is good, the game was in Knoxville, and the final score is nowhere near a proper representation of how hard UK played and how good the game was until the fourth quarter. Beating LSU and South Carolina still carries just enough weight to keep the Cats this high, but there’s at least one more loss coming.

9 Alabama Crimson Tide

Record: (7-2)
Last Week Rank: 13
Week 10: Alabama 31, LSU 13
Up Next: at Vanderbilt
It looks the part, it plays the part, and it’s always easy to simply assume that everything is amazing … because it’s Alabama. (The College Football Playoff committee doesn’t wear “… because it’s Alabama” t-shirts, but it is considering matching tattoos.)
That was an impressive performance against LSU, and there are dominant wins over Kentucky and South Carolina to respect, but it did lose to …

8. Tennessee Volunteers

Record: (7-2)
Last Week Rank: 12
Week 10: Tennessee 34, Kentucky 6
Up Next: at Texas A&M
it took a super-fun bad-day-on-the-road-in-the-SEC loss to South Carolina, and a fight against Texas – that was before the Vol quarterback change, by the way – to get two losses, but we’re only a few weeks removed from the Cats 26-10ing Bama. Combine that with a strong win over Kentucky, and the Vols have 10-2 written all over them.

7. Texas Longhorns

Record: (7-2)
Last Week Rank: 8
Week 10: Texas 34, Missouri 20
Up Next: at LSU
At this point, the impressive wins are piling up: Ohio State when it was No. 1, at Tennessee, Ole Miss, and now at Missouri. Texas State and UTSA aren’t awful Group of Six non-conference wins, either. Now comes an interesting date at LSU to see just how good this banged-up Longhorn team really is.

6. Miami Hurricanes

Record: (8-1)
Last Week Rank: 4
Week 10: Notre Dame 31, Miami 24
Up Next: Duke
Against a team that’s been obsessing about this game for over a year, and in a stadium full of fans frothing at the mouth for a big win, and with everything clicking for a team good enough to be in the national title mix, Miami still almost pulled that out of the fire (and without Malachi Toney, too).

5. Notre Dame Fighting Irish

Record: (8-1)
Last Week Rank: 6
Week 10: Notre Dame 31, Miami 24
Up Next: Boston College
You want to talk pressure, it was all on the Notre Dame side of the field, especially when it all started to collapse in the second half. That was wonderful, but remember, Florida State took the Canes to overtime, and North Carolina pressed this team, too, and … whatever. The Irish came up with the win it absolutely had to have, or this would’ve been a rough rest of the season.

4. BYU Cougars

Record: (7-2)
Last Week Rank: 5
Week 10: Utah 28, BYU 20
Up Next: Baylor
Yeah, the UCF loss is going to be uglier by the week, but BYU is still the team that beat Notre Dame, and it just gave Utah a heck of a Holy War. Watch out for the home games against Baylor and Cincinnati coming up – those will be good measuring sticks.

3. UCLA Bruins

Record: (9-0)
Last Week Rank: 2
Week 10: UCLA 34, Minnesota 20
Up Next: Illinois
We’re now past the point of questioning whether or not this is for real. It wasn’t warm in Minneapolis, and it was an early start for the Los Angeles guys, and it didn’t matter. This is a hard-nosed team that just sidestepped one dangerous landmine. The Bruins have a style and a pattern, and it all works.

2. Utah Utes

Record: (9-0)
Last Week Rank: 3
Week 10: Utah 28, BYU 20
Up Next: at Arizona
Things weren’t going well. After a dream start, Utah looked like it was going to pull a full Ohio State vs. Oregon meltdown, but instead it toughened up on defense, kept it simple on offense, and quarterback Devon Dampier was the brilliant veteran the program needed him to be.

1. Georgia Bulldogs

Record: (8-1)
Last Week Rank: 1
Week 10: Georgia 42, Ole Miss 7
Up Next: Missouri
We told you last week that the win over Florida was the moment when it all became crystal clear. The Auburn loss the week before was unfocused, but it appeared to be just the thing this team needed. It has taken its game up several levels over the last few weeks. The depth, speed, power, and confidence the Bulldogs are showing are breathtaking.