With the 2024 season officially in the books following Monday’s College Football Playoff National Championship Game, which Ohio State won 34-23 over Notre Dame, all eyes are now on the 2025 season.
FOX Sports analyst Joel Klatt revealed his Way-Too-Early Top 10 ranking for the 2025 college football season during Thursday’s The Joel Klatt Show: A College Football Podcast, with a special surprise at No. 1.
Klatt remains high on the power of a roster full of experienced veterans, and Penn State fits that bill better than most entering next season. Klatt also included SEC powers Texas and Georgia in his Top 5, as well as the reigning CFP national champion Buckeyes, before shaking things up in the bottom half of his Top 10.
Klatt also made a point to mention several programs that just missed out on his Top 10 ranking, including Alabama, Arizona State, BYU, Florida, Illinois, South Carolina, and Tennessee.
Check out Joel Klatt’s Way-Too-Early Top 10 ranking for the 2025 college football season below:
Klatt starts his Top 10 with a massive surprise, tabbing another Big Ten power to begin the 2025 season atop his personal preseason ranking. Much like Michigan and Ohio State before them, the Nittany Lions will be led by a litany of experienced superstars that played significant roles during Penn State‘s 2024 run to the College Football Playoffs. Key among those returns are QB Drew Allar and running backs Kaytron Allen and Nick Singleton. It’s the Nittany Lions’ wealth of elite experience that Klatt believes will be what could carry the Big Ten to a third-straight national champion in 2025.
Klatt: “Penn State has gotten better every single year for the past 3-4 years, and James Franklin and (the Nittany Lions were) knocking on the door of a national championship (in 2024), and now they’re bringing all of those key pieces back to their team. This is the blueprint. … Culture, togetherness, chemistry, whatever you want to call it or define it, it has to be held with guys that committed there. … That’s what Penn State is going to have.”
Klatt is eager to see rising redshirt sophomore QB Arch Manning finally unleashed after two years of backing up NFL-bound Quinn Ewers. And while there are clear questions with a rebuilt Texas offensive line and several inexperienced playmakers, the ‘Horns will have healthy RB CJ Baxter back to set the tone offensively. Klatt acknowledged Texas’ difficult 2025 schedule, but few teams will have the Longhorns’ talent.
Klatt: “It’s officially Arch Manning time in Austin. … Steve Sarkisian is going to be the benefactor of an incredible amount of patience from a young player and his family. … This is a team that continues to build their roster with elite-level recruiting, you know they’re going to do well in the transfer portal. … The major question I have is that they’re offensive line was so good, who’s going to be upfront. They have to replace four of the five offensive line starters.”
Klatt drops the reigning CFP National Champions to No. 3 in his preseason rankings due in large part to the wealth of experienced departures that helped fuel last season’s historic run. That includes QB Will Howard, RB TreVeyon Henderson, WR Emeka Egbuka and most of its elite 2024 defense. Ohio State returns superstar sophomore WR Jeremiah Smith and elite junior safety Caleb Downs to lead the way on both sides of the ball. If the Buckeyes can find viable replacements on its decimated defense, back-to-back championships remain a serious possibility.
Klatt: “The national champs will look a lot different next year, there’s no doubt. But they’re still going to be an elite team, and they’ve still got two players specifically that I think could be the two best players on each side of the ball in the sport. … Hard to take a huge step back when you’ve got the best player in the sport on each side of the ball.”
Despite what he termed “a down year” for the Bulldogs, Klatt has no doubt the SEC Champions will once again be a serious national championship contender in 2025. Carson Beck is now in Miami, so it’s officially QB Gunner Stockton‘s team, and Klatt is high on WR transfers Zachariah Branch (USC) and Noah Thomas (Texas A&M) out of the portal. Still, Klatt acknowledged the Bulldogs need to improve their ground game, including along the offensive line, ahead of next season.
Klatt: “What they have done from a roster-building standpoint is impressive. … If we think Georgia is going anywhere or that this is a trend in the wrong direction, we would all be sorely mistaken. Kirby Smart is far too driven. … I don’t have a lot of questions for a team (whose) last four recruiting classes were second, first, second and third in the country. I know that they’re loaded with talent.”
The only team to remain undefeated through Championship Week in 2024 was the Ducks, but Klatt appears conflicted about their placement at 5. Former UCLA transfer QB Dante Moore slides in as Dillon Gabriel‘s replacement, and he’ll be aided by WR Evan Stewart combing back and a defense that returns elite talent in the trenches, including EDGE Matayo Uiagalelei, who had 10.5 sacks in 2024, and USC DL transfer Bear Alexander.
Klatt: “I think candidly they could go a lot higher in this. Someone could talk me into them at 2, someone could talk me into them at 3. … They’ve got to replace Dillon Gabriel, but remember, they got his replacement last year when they got Dante Moore to transfer from UCLA up to Eugene. … (Dan) Lanning has built this thing the rigth way, he knows how to win, it’s in the trenches.”
The 2024 national runner-ups fall just outside the Top 5 in Klatt’s Way-Too-Early ranking mostly due to what it’s losing off last season’s team, including sparkplug QB Riley Leonard. Klatt is high on elite freshman QB CJ Carr, the grandson of former Michigan coach Lloyd Carr, as well as a loaded Irish offensive line that will have running backs Jeremiyah Love and Jadarian Price in the backfield once again.
Klatt: “I love what Marcus Freeman is building. … The culture at Notre Dame is excellent, and the team, I believe is elite. I will be absolutely shocked if Notre Dame is not back in the College Football Playoff next year. That’s the level that Marcus Freeman is now competing at. He’s building something very special.”
Klatt admits Clemson could land anywhere within the Top 15, but he puts them at 7 due in large part to what they have returning, led by third-year starting QB Cade Klubnik, four of five starting offensive lineman, and DLs TJ Parker and Peter Woods to name a few. Klatt is also high on new DC Tom Allen, who should improve the Tigers defense in 2025 after coming over from Penn State.
Klatt: “I love Clemson and what they’re doing. I love the fact that Klubnik is back for his third year as the starter in the same offense. Dabo Swinney is finally, what for it, dabbling in the portal. Ok, here we go. … So I think that their roster could be a little bit better.”
The Hurricanes are following a similar script to what made them one of the biggest surprises of 2024 by signing a talented veteran QB rental in Georgia transfer Carson Beck. Klatt believes Beck will be in a better position in Coral Gables than he was in Athens last season, mostly given a stacked offensive line and elite playmakers on the outside. The ‘Canes defense will be tested early vs. Notre Dame and Florida.
Klatt: “Miami has gone and gotten a very experienced quaterback, Carson Beck is in Miami and … he’s going to try and replicate a lot of what Cam Ward was able to do this last year. Now is Beck going to be as good as Cam Ward? I don’t know. … Is he going to be a very good option? … Yes.”
Klatt sees the Tigers in win-now mode entering Year 4 under Brian Kelly, and believes LSU will benefit from a second season with Garrett Nussmeier at quarterback. The veteran signal-caller should enter the season as a Heisman Trophy favorite after an electric first season as the starter, where he threw for 4,052 yards and 29 touchdowns, but the Tigers need to show improvement defensively to valid this Top 10 ranking.
Klatt: “I think this is a critical year, obviously, for Brian Kelly. They need to show a significant step in the right direction. And I don’t think that’s out of the question because they have been active, certainly in the portal with the No. 1 portal class in college football up to this point. … And moreso than anything, they get Nussmeier back.”
Klatt is extremely high on the Wolverines mostly given how they finished the 2024 season, citing impressive end-of-season wins over the reigning National Champion Buckeyes in The Game and traditional national power Alabama in the ReliaQuest Bowl. Michigan does lose some key names off its defense, but will have a wealth of returning talent in Year 2 under Sherrone Moore as well as key additions such as prized Five-Star+ Plus quarterback Bryce Underwood and Crimson Tide transfer RB Justice Haynes.
Klatt: “Michigan built as much momentum as any team in college football over the last month of the season. … In this era where nobody gets to win their last game except for the national champion, maybe the only other team in the country that has real positive sentiment moving forward and into the offseason is Michigan.”
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