FOX Analyst Ranks All 136 FBS College Football Teams — Here's Where Purdue Falls
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Add RJ Young to the growing list of skeptics regarding Purdue's potential during the 2025 season. The FOX college football analyst recently ranked all 136 teams at the FBS level, with the Boilermakers listed as the worst team among all Power Four squads entering the year.
Young ranked Purdue at No. 99 for the upcoming season, the lowest of any team in major college football. The Boilermakers were two spots ahead of Michigan State, which ranked No. 97 in Young's evaluation.
I won't rehash the complete list of the 136 schools and where they ranked, but here's where every Big Ten team fell in Young's rankings:
- No. 2 — Ohio State Buckeyes
- No. 3 — Oregon Ducks
- No. 7 — Penn State Nittany Lions
- No. 11 — Indiana Hoosiers
- No. 12 — Michigan Wolverines
- No. 16 — Illinois Fighting Illini
- No. 26 — USC Trojans
- No. 29 — Iowa Hawkeyes
- No. 30 — Nebraska Cornhuskers
- No. 48 — UCLA Bruins
- No. 49 — Washington Huskies
- No. 51 — Wisconsin Badgers
- No. 55 — Northwestern Wildcats
- No. 62 — Rutgers Scarlet Knights
- No. 69 — Minnesota Golden Gophers
- No. 76 — Maryland Terrapins
- No. 97 — Michigan State Spartans
- No. 99 — Purdue Boilermakers
Did @RJ_Young really rank all 136 FBS teams ahead of the season? Yes, yes he did 🙌🔥
— FOX College Football (@CFBONFOX) August 11, 2025
Where did your team land on his rankings? 🤔📊 pic.twitter.com/6H1ejN8DDq
Boilers rank last in ESPN Big Ten power rankings
Young isn't the only analyst low on Purdue heading into the 2025 season. ESPN's Adam Rittenberg also ranked the Boilermakers last in his Big Ten football power rankings entering the year.
"Barry Odom is back in the Power 4 following an impressive run at UNLV. He takes over a Purdue team with almost an entirely new roster and a schedule that includes Notre Dame and Ohio State," Rittenberg writes. "Moderate improvement is the goal for Odom, whose track record on defense and with personnel suggests better days are ahead."
Purdue was also predicted to finish last in the conference in the Cleveland.com preseason Big Ten poll. It was the second straight year in which the Boilers were projected to finish 18th.
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Dustin Schutte is the publisher of Purdue Boilermakers on SI and has spent more than a decade working in sports journalism. His career began in 2013, when he covered Big Ten football. He remained in that role for eight years before working at On SI to cover the Boilermakers. Dustin graduated from Manchester University in Indiana in 2010, where he played for the men's tennis team.
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