First Coaches Poll shows that Big 12 will have to earn its respect this season

There was once a time when polls were everything in college football given that the sport didn't have a playoff. Now, times have changed and this season, 12 teams will participate in the expanded College Football Playoff for the first time.

However, polls still have their place in the sport and that's why the release of the first Coaches Poll of 2024 on Monday was noteworthy. Perhaps the biggest lesson we can take away from the rankings is that the Big 12 is not going to get the benefit of the doubt from the voters this year.

In the top 25, you will not find a Big 12 team until No. 13 Utah. What's more, only three Big 12 teams are in the top 20 with Kansas State and Oklahoma State sitting at No. 17 and No. 18 respectively.

The only other Big 12 programs in the poll are Arizona at No. 21 and Kansas at No. 24. As expected, the Red Raiders will begin the season on the outside looking in.

On the other end of the spectrum, the two most powerful conferences in the country, the SEC and the Big Ten, dominate the poll. Those two leagues are represented in ten of the first twelve spots in the poll.

Georgia sits at No. 1 followed by Ohio State, Oregon, Texas, and Alabama. The rest of the top ten is Ole Miss at No. 6, Notre Dame at No. 7, Michigan at No. 8, Penn State at No. 9, and Florida State at No. 10.

Why does it matter that the Big Ten and SEC dominate the poll? Because when the at-large bids are handed out for the College Football Playoff, the polls will help shape the opinions of the schools vying for a spot.

Now, the Coaches Poll won't factor into the selection process because the CFP will have its own ranking system. However, college football fans, and more importantly, CFP selection committee members are always going to be influenced by polls. They are human, after all, and for decades, we've been led to believe that polls are the be-all of college football. That's a tough habit to break.

So take Texas Tech for instance. The Red Raiders won't play a team that is currently ranked until week six when they travel to Arizona. That's almost half of the season that will go by before the Red Raiders get to potentially earn a win that will turn heads around the nation.

Thus, it is likely that even if Tech starts the year 5-0, the Red Raiders won't crack the top 25. What's more, only two of the Red Raiders' opponents this year, Arizona and Oklahoma State, are going to start the year ranked. That means that the opportunities for true resume-building wins could be few.

If the Red Raiders, or any other Big 12 team, for that matter, want to be considered a contender for the CFP, the path is narrow. It is conceivable that the conference could earn only one bid to the playoff given how little it appears the voters think of the Big 12 in comparison to the SEC and the Big Ten.

That's why the non-conference portion of the season could mean more for the Big 12 than any other league. This conference is going to have to earn everything it gets this year and for the foreseeable future.

We already knew that would be the case. However, seeing that reality put before us in something tangible such as the coaches poll is a stark reminder that the Big 12 still faces an uphill battle when it comes to earning its place in the college football landscape.