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AP to kick off 83rd year of Top 25 football poll

Georgia's Deandre Baker knocks the ball away from Alabama's Calvin Ridley during the second half of the NCAA college football playoff championship game Monday, Jan. 8, 2018, in Atlanta. (AP Photo/David Goldman)

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The Associated Press will release the preseason edition of the AP Top 25, the longest-running college football poll of its kind, on Monday, Aug. 20. The preseason AP All-America team, an extension of the longest-running honor roll of the nation’s top players, will be released the next day on Tuesday, Aug. 21.

An expert panel of sports writers and broadcasters from AP-affiliated media around the country decide the AP Top 25, which is entering its 83rd year, and will select the preseason All-America players for each position to first and second teams. The first AP All-America team was selected in 1925, a decade before the first Heisman Trophy. 

“The AP has a long history of leading the conversation around which teams are the best in the land and who are the best players each year,” said Barry Bedlan, director of AP Sports products. “We are excited to extend these rich traditions into another season of college football. 

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Georgia’s Deandre Baker knocks the ball away from Alabama’s Calvin Ridley during the second half of the NCAA college football playoff championship game Monday, Jan. 8, 2018, in Atlanta. Alabama was No. 1 in last year’s preseason AP Top 25 and finished the season on top after defeating Georgia in the national championship. Both the Crimson Tide and Bulldogs are likely to be ranked high again in the AP poll. (AP Photo/David Goldman)

“AP prides itself on maintaining some of the richest college football traditions, whether it’s the longest-running poll of its kind or the marquee All-America team. This extends that reach.”

The AP Top 25 preseason poll and the preseason All-America team will be announced on AP lines to customers at 12 p.m. ET on Aug. 20 and 21, respectively, as well as posted on AP’s college football poll site, https://collegefootball.ap.org/poll; the APNews college football hub, https://apnews.com/tag/Collegefootball; and the AP News app. AP will provide analysis and details across those platforms, plus a weekly All-America Watch feature by College Football Writer Ralph Russo.

All AP customers can leverage the popularity of the AP poll to grow digital traffic and new revenue through AP’s locally branded College Football Digital News Experience. Newspapers that subscribe to AP Sports also will get paginated pages designed by the Adams Publishing Group’s Big Sky News Design team that highlight the preseason poll results for use in print, each with space available for local advertising or content. 

All 1,135 of the weekly AP polls released since 1936 have been tabulated to determine the 100 top teams of all time, listed at https://collegefootball.ap.org/ap-poll-all-time

A panel of more than 60 sports writers and broadcasters votes weekly throughout each season to decide the AP Top 25. All voters have an extensive background in covering college football. The poll is determined by a simple points system based on how each voter ranks college football’s best teams. A team receives 25 points for each first place vote, 24 for second place and so on through to the 25th team, which receives one point. The rankings are set by listing the teams’ point totals from highest to lowest. The mathematical formula is the same as the one used for the AP Top 25 rankings for college men’s and women’s basketball.

Follow the poll and related sports coverage on Facebook and Twitter: https://twitter.com/AP_Top25.

Contact

For media inquiries:
Bryan Baldwin
Director of Internal Communications
The Associated Press
212-621-1724
bbaldwin@ap.org

For sponsorship or revenue opportunities:
Barry Bedlan
Sports Products Director
The Associated Press
972-677-2270
bbedlan@ap.org

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