Coaches Poll top 25: Winners, losers in Week 12 college football rankings

Where things stand in the latest Coaches Poll top 25 college football rankings coming out an eventful Saturday and moving into a consequential Week 12 slate.

The updated Coaches Poll top 25 college football rankings for Week 12. | Brett Davis | Imagn Images

As expected, there was no change at the very top of the updated Coaches Poll top 25 college football rankings this week, save that the coaches rearranged some of their first-place votes.

Ohio State was once again the near-consensus vote for the best team in the country, but the coaches were less enthused with Indiana’s close result at Penn State and more so with Texas A&M’s dominant victory at Missouri.

Consequently, they took the Hoosiers’ one first-place vote and gave it to the Aggies, who are undefeated for the first time since 1992 and seemingly headed for a place in the SEC Championship Game in the weeks to come.

Facing a dilemma on how to order rivals Texas and Oklahoma, the coaches decided not to face it, as the two SEC hopefuls were one of two outright ties in the final vote this week.

Georgia Tech, idle last weekend, and former Big 12 leader BYU, which lost to new conference favorite Texas Tech, also received the same number of votes this time around.

Where does that leave everything in the updated Top 25 college football rankings? Let’s take a look at what teams moved up, and down, and who stayed put, in Week 12, according to the coaches’ vote.

Coaches Poll for Week 12

First-place votes in parentheses

1. Ohio State (59)
2. Indiana
3. Texas A&M (4)
4. Alabama
5. Georgia
6. Oregon
7. Ole Miss
8. Texas Tech
9. Notre Dame
10. Texas
T-10. Oklahoma
12. Georgia Tech
T-12. BYU
14. Vanderbilt
15. Utah
16. Miami
17. Michigan
18. USC
19. Virginia
20. Tennessee
21. Louisville
22. Cincinnati
23. Pittsburgh
24. Missouri
25. James Madison

Teams that dropped out

Memphis (23). This was the presumptive Group of Five selection in last week’s playoff committee rankings, but a loss to American insurgent Tulane could prove very costly.

Iowa (24). Hand it to the Hawkeyes. They played top-ten Oregon hard all day and went down to the wire, even taking a late lead, but had no answer for the Ducks on a last-minute drive.

Other teams receiving votes

These teams got votes from the coaches, but not enough to be included in the rankings this week

USF 99; North Texas 98; Iowa 81; Houston 73; Tulane 53; SMU 32; Illinois 15; Washington 12; Arizona 7; Nebraska 6; Memphis 6; Arizona State 3; Navy 2; San Diego State 1; East Carolina 1

Coaches Poll biggest movers

BYU (Down 4). Undefeated no more, the Cougars’ 22-point loss to new Big 12 leader Texas Tech didn’t look very inspiring, and now they’re one big step back in the competitive conference title picture.

Texas Tech (Up 1). Conversely, the Red Raiders retake their position as the favorite in the Big 12 and look poised for a run at the College Football Playoff behind another strong defensive performance.

Louisville (Down 6). The coaches didn’t care for the Cardinals dropping an overtime result against unranked Cal, causing more chaos in the ACC title picture.

Pittsburgh (Up 7). But one of those other ACC hopefuls saw a nice jump despite being idle, as the Panthers sit at 7-2.

Missouri (Down 7). A third loss, and this one not nearly as close as the others, have the Tigers moving down the rankings at 6-3, but not out just yet.