Rece Davis among AP top 25 voters who snubbed Ohio State from No. 1 ranking

Not everyone who votes on the AP top 25 college football rankings thought Ohio State was the best team in the country. Who departed from that consensus this week?

Ohio State is the No. 1 team in the latest AP top 25 college football rankings, but not everyone agreed when casting their votes. | Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

Ohio State emerged as the expected No. 1 team in the AP top 25 college football rankings entering the Week 3 games, but not everyone agreed with that sentiment.

Granted, the reigning national champion Buckeyes did secure the overwhelming majority 57 first-place votes in the latest AP poll, but eight other ballots cast their No. 1 votes for a combination of three other teams this week.

Ohio State’s main competition in the Big Ten this year, Penn State and Oregon, were two other teams that got No. 1 votes, and SEC contender LSU was the other.

One of them was Rece Davis, the host of ESPN’s flagship College GameDay program, who put LSU ahead of the Buckeyes at No. 1 in his ballot this week.

Davis didn’t keep the Buckeyes far from pole position, as he ranked them No. 2 in his poll, followed by Miami at 3, Oregon at 4, and Penn State at No. 5 this week.

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Penn State placed second with five first-place votes, while LSU was third with two, and Oregon secured one first-place vote after demolishing Oklahoma State on Saturday.

Those who voted in favor of Penn State? That was Brian Howell of BuffZone.com, Mason Young of Tulsa World, Kirk Kenney of the San Diego Union-Tribune, Pete Yanity of WSPA-TV, and Koki Riley of The Advocate in Baton Rouge.

LSU’s other first-place vote was cast by Jon Wilner of the San Jose Mercury News, keeping Ohio State at No. 2, and notably Florida State at No. 4 behind Miami and ahead of Oregon, which trounced the Cowboys by a 69-3 count on Saturday.

Oregon’s sole first-place vote was cast by Robert Cessna of the Bryan-College Station (Tex.) Eagle, placing Ohio State at No. 2 and keeping Penn State down at No. 5.

Ohio State’s lowest ranking this week was at No. 3, in ballots submitted by Riley, Kenney, and Yanity.

Georgia edged out the Buckeyes in Kenney’s ballot, Oregon in Yanity’s, and LSU in Riley’s vote.

The two voters who the AP designated as being affiliated with Michigan -- Nicole Auerbach of NBC Sports and Aaron McCann of MLive Media Group -- both stayed with the consensus and kept Ohio State as the No. 1 team in college football this week.

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