Our first rankings, ahead of the CFP committee's Tuesday:

It's time to start breaking down our tiers into rankings, as the NCAA College Football Playoff committee prepares for ITS first rankings on Tuesday evening. Here are our top 35 FBS teams after Week 9 of the 2015 season:

Tier A) 1. LSU (7-0). 2. Clemson (8-0). 3. Alabama (7-1). 4. Notre Dame (7-1). 5. TCU (7-0).
Tier B) 6. Michigan St (8-0). 7. Florida (7-1). 8. Ohio St (8-0).  9. Oklahoma (7-1). 10. Baylor (8-0). 11. Stanford (7-1).
Tier C) 12. Iowa (8-0). 13. Ole Miss (7-2). 14. Michigan (6-2). 15. Texas A&M (6-2). 16. Utah (7-1). 17. Mississippi St (6-2).
Tier D) 18. Oklahoma St (8-0). 19. Memphis (8-0). 20. Toledo (7-0). 21. Houston (8-0). 22. Temple (7-1).
Tier E) 23. UCLA (6-2). 24. Florida St (7-1). 25. BYU (6-2). 26. Wisconsin (7-2). 27. Georgia (5-3).
Tier F) 28. North Carolina (7-1). 29. USC (5-3). 30. Appalachian St (7-1). 31. Duke (6-2).
Tier G) 32. Tennessee (4-4). 33. Navy (6-1). 34. Boise St (7-2). 35. Northwestern (7-2). 36. California (5-3). 37. Auburn (4-4).

Tier H) Pitt, Miami-Fl, West Virginia, Oregon, Arizona St, Arkansas, Louisiana Tech, Bowling Green.
Tier I) Georgia Tech, Minnesota, Kansas St, Kentucky, Missouri, Northern Illinois.
Tier J) Texas Tech, Washington St, Arizona, Vanderbilt, South Carolina, Cincinnati, Marshall, San Diego St.
Tier K) Boston College, Indiana, Iowa St, Texas, East Carolina, Central Michigan, Western Michigan, Air Force, Utah St.
Tier L) Purdue, Nebraska, South Florida, U Conn, Southern Miss, Georgia Southern.
Tier M) Syracuse, Virginia, Illinois, Arkansas St.
Tier N) Wake Forest, Colorado, Tulsa, Ohio, Akron.
Tier O) Rutgers, Maryland, Oregon St, Middle Tennessee, Buffalo.
Tier P) Rice, Colorado St, Nevada, UNLV.
Tier Q) SMU, FIU, Ball St, San Jose St, UL-Lafayette.
Tier R) Tulane, FAU, New Mexico, Texas St, Troy.
Tier S) Kent St, Idaho, Hawaii, Fresno St.

And the Bottom Sixteen...

Tier T) 113. U Mass (1-7). 114. Kansas (0-8). 115. South Alabama (3-4). 116. Old Dominion (3-5). 117. Wyoming (1-8).
Tier U) 118. Army-West Point (2-6). 119. UT-San Antonio (1-7). 120. New Mexico St (1-7). 121. North Texas (1-7). 122. UL-Monroe (1-7).
Tier V) 123. Miami-OH (1-8). 124. UTEP (3-5). 125. Georgia St (2-5). 126. Charlotte (2-6). 127. Eastern Michigan (1-8). 128. Central Florida (0-9).

As for Top Eights, the Power Five conferences hold the first eight spots above, while the Top Eight for the Group Of Five conferences (pivotal for bowl placement) are as follows right now:
1. Memphis (#19) - 2. Toledo (#20) - 3. Houston (#21) - 4. Temple (#22) - 5. BYU (#25) - 6. Appalachian St (#30) - 7. Navy (#33) - 8. Boise St (#34). 

And the Bottom Fives? Well, all of Tier V comes from the Group Of Five conferences, so there's your bottom five there (UTEP through UCF). As for the Power Five conferences, here are their Bottom Five:
1. Kansas (tier T) - 2. Maryland (tier O) - 3. Rutgers (tier O) - 4. Oregon St (tier O) - 5. Wake Forest (tier N). 

Rankings for the FCS teams and the NFL will come out in the next 24 hours or so...

New post on the NCAA page!

We'll post a quick note whenever we add to our side pages - in this case, it's a summary of our top/bottom predictions for the NCAA division 1 conferences in 2015.

And - what about the four "Football Championship" schools who don't DO championships?

Regardless of the name, four of the twelve "FCS" schools do NOT participate in the championship playoffs - the Ivy League and Patriot League (both filled with top academic schools with - ahem - better things to do), and the MEAC and SWAC, the two "historically black colleges", or HBCs, which this season have decided to hold their own private championship, the "Celebration Bowl", which will (we suppose) unofficially crown the top HBC of the season.

So, let's look a little closer!

The Ivy League:
Of course, Harvard is the traditional power in the Ivy League, and comes into 2015 as the favorite again, with Yale and Dartmouth the only two teams with realistic aspirations to dethrone the two-time titlists. Brown, Princeton, and Penn will fill the center slots, while the Columbia/Cornell matchup (hysterical last year) once again will decide which team goes 1-9 and which goes 0-10. (We'll take Columbia to lose again.) 

The Patriot League:
Fordham has the same kind of stranglehold on the Patriot that Harvard does in the Ivy; their chasers include Bucknell and Lafayette, with Holy Cross and Colgate right behind, and Lehigh hanging on to their tails. Georgetown is the bottom of the ladder, but not as poor as Columbia or Cornell. 

So, our top four in the "Football Intramural Subdivision" will be Harvard, Fordham, Dartmouth and Yale for starters; and our "Bottom Three" would be Columbia, Cornell, and Georgetown. For what it's worth.

Meanwhile, in the Historically Black College conferences,

The MEAC:
...is a three-way fight between defending champ North Carolina A&T, South Carolina St, and Bethune-Cookman, and a one-loss, three-way tie is almost expected. Right behind them are North Carolina Central and Morgan St, vying for 4th and 5th. Then there's a gap to Hampton, Norfolk St, Howard, and Florida A&M, four schools with famous bands that almost make up for their teams! Pulling up the rear will be Delaware St and legendary Savannah St, seen most recently playing a running-clock game at Florida St because the rout was THAT BAD.

The SWAC:
In two divisions, there's a separation between the best team (Alcorn St) in the East, and the two most famous teams (Southern and Grambling St) in the West. Alcorn is only threatened by Alabama St, with three others trailing far behind: Alabama A&T, Jackson St, and Mississippi Valley St. In the West, Southern and Grambling are closely followed by Prairie View A&M, with a gap back to Texas-Southern and Arkansas-Pine Bluff.

So, our top four in the "HBC Subdivision" will be Alcorn St, North Carolina A&T, South Carolina St, and Bethune-Cookman to start the season; while our "Bottom Three" start as Savannah St, Delaware St, and Mississippi Valley St. 

To finish our FCS conversation from yesterday...

Yesterday, we laid out the 24 teams we believe most likely to make the FCS playoffs - North Dakota St, Illinois St, Youngstown St, South Dakota St, Northern Iowa and Indiana St from the MVC; Eastern Washington, Montana, Idaho St, and Montana St from the Big Sky; New Hampshire, Villanova, James Madison and Richmond from the Colonial; Sam Houston St, SE Louisiana, and Stephen F Austin from the Southland Conference;  Jacksonville St, Eastern Illinois, and Eastern Kentucky from the Ohio Valley Conference; Coastal Carolina and Liberty from the Big South; St. Francis (PA) OR Bryant from the Northeast Conference; and Jacksonville from the Pioneer League.

Ah, the Pioneer League! Our FCS island of castaways. Sun Belt Light. When the two teams who've won titles in your league are as distant from each other as Jacksonville (FL) and San Diego (CA), there's something not-so-natural about your league. Its denizens come from across the country, teams that couldn't latch on to the stronger leagues in their own necks of the woods. 

Using the Sagarin Rating system to conceptualize the relative strengths of the teams, let's give you a sense of the realities of the Pioneer League:
Median Sagarin Rating for each FCS conference:
Missouri Valley: 63 (meaning the middle team in the conference is at 63)
Big Sky: 46
Colonial: 50
Ohio Valley: 49
Southland: 52
Big South: 52
Northeast: 49

By comparison, Jacksonville is at 43, and leads the Pioneer by ten points. 
Here are the current Sagarin ratings for the other teams in the Pioneer - notice the range of locations as well... 
*Drake (IL), San Diego (CA), and Dayton (OH) - 33
*Marist (NY) - 25
*Campbell (NC) - 22
*Butler (IN) - 19
*Valparisio (IN) and Morehead St (KY) - 18
*Stetson (FL) - 17
*Davidson (NC) - 6.

The only schools whose teams are anywhere near these ratings in the FCS are legends to Bottom Eight readers of Following Football: Nicholls St (17), Houston Baptist (13), Robert Morris (19), Delaware St (19), and good ol' Savannah St (12), who plays two or three big time FBS schools like Florida St and Oklahoma, usually losing by 70-80 points.

Here at Following Football, we are just as interested with the bottom of the list as the top. As we are handicapped by not getting TV coverage of these fine schools' teams, we will start the season's FCS Bottom Five from these Sagarin ratings from the end of 2014:

 Davidson, Robert Morris, Houston Baptist, Stetson, and Nicholls St.

However, we'll keep track of all of these schools, and keep you informed on both ends of the spectrum in 2015!   

Here's our predictions for the rest of the FBS conferences!

Having just posted our predictions for the Power Five conferences (the ACC, Big Ten, Big Twelve, Pac-12, and SEC), it's time to take a look at the other five conferences in the Bowl Subdivision - the American, Conference USA, the MAC, the Mountain West, and the Sun Belt Conference. Here we go!

The American Athletic Conference (formerly the Big East):
*Six teams will vie for the title, so the champ may have two or even three conf losses!
*In the West, Memphis looks the class, although Houston will host them on Nov 14 and could steal the division with a win there.
*Navy's joined a conference for the first time in their 135 years of football! Looking at 3rd...
*Tulane should beat Tulsa at home and lock up 4th, while SMU will be better than last year, even if it doesn't get them out of the basement.
*In the East, it's easier to start at the bottom: UConn 6th, and South Florida 5th.
*All four of the others should thrash each other into a 5-3 logjam! We'll wager on East Carolina 1st, Central Florida 2nd, and Cincinnati 3rd with Temple in 4th. But who knows?
*Given that, we'll take Memphis to win the title game.

Conference USA:
*The winner of the Marshall at Western Kentucky game wins the division and the title.
*As of this moment? We'll lean on the revenge factor and pick the Thundering Herd.
*Middle Tennessee heads a distant pack behind them in the East.
*Pencil in Old Dominion, FIU, FAU, and newcomer UNC-Charlotte in the 4/5/6/7 spots.
*Nobody in the West can punch with WKU or Marshall, but Louisiana Tech should get the chance.
*If not, it'll be Rice - they've developed a good system there.
*UTEP should be able to rise to third, and then it depends on some ball bounces: 
*We're thinking Southern Miss rises to 4th, North Texas 5th, and UTSA falls back to sixth.

Mid-American Conference (the MAC):
*They've marketed a marginal conference well - the Tuesday and Wednesday night games on ESPN, the "#MACtion" tweets, and all the exciting play from clever coaches. 
*The power division here is the West, where by throwing their names in a hat I came up with:
*Northern Illinois winning the division (most experience winning).
*Toledo 2nd, Western Michigan fighting a tough schedule for third, and Ball St in 4th.
*Central Michigan is an easy 5th place pick, because the top 4 are significantly better, and...
*Eastern Michigan is conceivably the worst team in football, at least this year in the FBS.
*In the East, Bowling Green is the class of the division (though they'll lose the title game).
*Only Terry Bowden's Akron has a shot to dethrone them, with Frank Solich's Ohio team in third. 
*Four bad teams round out the MAC-East: U-Mass (bad), Buffalo (bad), Kent St (really bad), and Miami of Ohio (so bad Miami-FL makes them distinguish that they are not the same school). 

Mountain West conference:
* This year, it should be Boise State and the eleven dwarves, but that remains to be proven. 
*Boise's rating numbers are so far above everyone else's that they should be 8-0 in conference, with only a tough out-of-conf schedule to manage. If they goes 3-1 there, they should be playing in a major bowl again. 
*Utah St figures to give them the best battle, although they've hit some rocky stretches here.
*CSU, Air Force, Wyoming, and New Mexico round out the Mountain division, in that order.
*In the West, six mediocre teams fight for the division title, with San Diego St looking like the best candidate for the job,
*Nevada's coming up on the rail for 2nd, and Fresno St's struggling this off-season. 
*San Jose may still be 4th, but not for lack of trying. Meanwhile, Hawaii will put some wins on the home field, and UNLV won't.

Sun Belt Conference:
*I know - this should've been in yellow...but Appalachian St and Georgia Southern are the 1-2 teams here...Only the two of them, plus maybe 3rd place Arkansas St and maybe 4th place Louisiana Lafayette would have a chance to win even one game in any other conference. Even the MAC or Conf-USA!
*Texas State is the best of the rest, and should be able to pull off a .500 or better record in league.
*After that, it's turtles all the way down. 
*Depending on how South Alabama takes to its 10-15 new players who were with UAB last year before their one year hiatus, they could be as high as sixth (maybe fifth?). Or UL-Monroe will slide from 7th up to 6th...
*Below that are four of the five Bottom Five teams to start the season (most likely): Troy in 8th; New Mexica St (9th), Idaho (10th), and Georgia State (11th).

So, to recap - the Bottom Five would be Troy,  NMSU, the Vandals, Georgia State, and Eastern Michigan, along with their intern, newbie Charlotte from the C-USA. (If we're counting Army as a non-Power conference team, then the Cadets from West Point will be in that Bottom mix as well.) Boise State should repeat as the Power of Five rep in the New Year's Six bowl games, and the conference champs will include Appalachian State, Northern Illinois, Marshall, and Memphis.

Speaking of college football, how about a few early predictions?

While here at Following Football:ACNC we don't rank our teams early so as not to bias ourselves against what we see, there's nothing to stop us from guessing how things are going to turn out! So, holding back the right to adjust these predictions as circumstances warrant until the season actually starts in September, here are some thoughts as they pertain to the actual conference races this fall...

Atlantic Coast Conference:
- The winner of the Florida St @ Clemson game wins the ACC title. (We bet Clemson.)
- Louisville 3rd and NC St 4th in the Atlantic; everyone else is putrid.
- Flip a coin between Miami, Georgia Tech, and Va-Tech for the Coastal crown...
-...we're taking Miami in an upset right now.
- Duke will still be good; just not AS good. 4th place. 
- Since UNC goes TO Pitt, we'll take Pitt for 5th and the Tar Heels 6th. 
- It'll be Al Golden's last year at Virginia, as they finish 7th in the Coastal division.

The B1G (the Big Ten, which of course has 14 teams):
- Ohio State is as good as they say. Undefeated season going into the CFP.
- Michigan State would be champs except for the Buckeyes.
- Penn St gets the Wolverines at home, so they get 3rd and Harbaugh gets 4th.
- The rest of the division is bad. Take Rutgers, Maryland, and Indiana in that order.
- Take Minnesota for the West Division! They get BOTH Wisc and Neb at home!
- Wisconsin will be ready to pounce on another division crown if the Gophers fail.
- Nebraska third, and nobody close behind them.
(But plan on Iowa, NW, Illinois, and terrible Purdue if you have to.)

The XII (the Big Twelve, which of course has 10 teams):
- TCU all the way, including a pounding of Baylor in Fort Worth and a trip to the CFP.
- The rest of the real class in the XII is Baylor and OU, who we see 2nd and 3rd.
- There's a logjam for mediocrity, which we're deciphering as Texas, K-St, OSU, and WVU.
- The bottom of the conference is still poor. Tech 8th, ISU 9th, KU 10th.

The Pac-12 Conference:
- Two tight races at the top: we'll flip a coin down south and say UCLA has the slightly easier road.
- Up north, we've a hunch that it's finally Stanford's year to get through OU to the CFP!
- The four other good teams in the conference are Arizona, Utah, Cal, and ASU. In that order.
- UW might join them, but let's see them against Boise St first. If they win there, then yes.
- Wazzu and Oregon St may have some chances to at least go to a bowl.
- Colorado definitely does NOT.

The Southeastern Conference:
- We're staying with 'Bama until they prove us wrong. Division, conference, CFP.
-...but LSU and Auburn are good choices, too, should "In Saban we trust" falter.
- 4th/5th is tight between Ole Miss and Arkansas; their game is in Mississippi, so we take the Rebels.
- 6th/7th would be 1st/2nd in most conferences. Here, it's placing Miss St in the cellar because A&M wins in Texas.
- Georgia's the only team in the Eastern Division that would have a chance in the West.
- The other six will go winless against the West. Book it!
- Vanderbilt will be last. But I'd prefer to school there than any of the other SEC schools.
- Spots 2-6 may be a five way tie at 3-5, but we'll say: UK, Mizzou, USC, FLA, and UT.

So to recap: The College Football Playoff should be TCU, Ohio St, Stanford, and 'Bama.
The Power Five Bottom Five (we're splitting it up this year!) may start with Vandy, Kansas, Colorado, Purdue, and Wake Forest. The Group of Five conferences are next.