Ohio State Buckeyes quarterback Julian Sayin (10) | USA TODAY Network via Reuters Co The 2026 College Football season is officially underway with USC being the lone Big Ten team to kick off their season in Week Zero. But all 18 teams will play between Thursday and Sunday in Week 1 fully kicking off the Big Ten football season. With the season getting underway, we present the Week Zero version of the Big Ten Power Poll. Think of this as your preseason rankings. What you see here in early September may look completely different from what we see in early December. Or, we could be spot on. We just don’t know. We think Ohio State will be really good and Purdue and Maryland will be pretty bad, but until they play the games we can’t know for sure. So check out our initial rankings and let us know in the comments if you agree or disagree. #1 Ohio State Buckeyes The Buckeyes begin the season ranked #1 nationally and in our power poll. Frankly on offense they are just loaded with Julien Sayin and Jeramiah Smith leading the way. But don’t count out Bo Jackson in the running game and five-star true freshman Chris Henry, Jr at WR as well. Add in the best interior lineman in the country and the Buckeyes ight be an unstoppable force on offense. They open up at home as 50.5 point favorites against Ball State and this one should be out of hand quickly. #2 Oregon Ducks The the Ohio State offensive discussion, and flip it to the other side of the ball and you can make the same argument about the Oregon defense. The Ducks are loaded on D. They return all four defensive line starters from a season ago when all could have been first or second day picks in the NFL draft. They added in the secondary replacing former Purdue safety Dylan Thieneman with thou who shall not be named who even after a subpar season last year is suddenly a first team Preseason All-American with Oregon. Oh yeah they got that Dante Moore guy at quarterback too who is pretty damn good. We need to wait until early November to see that Buckeye offense against that Duck defense, but it could be a classic. Oregon opens up at home as 24.5 point favorites against Boise State from the Mountain We….I mean Pac-12. That’s going to be hard to remember. #3 Indiana Hoosiers Doubt Curt Cignetti at your own risk at this point. The reigning national champions are back and have reloaded from the portal adding former TCU QB Josh Hoover to replace #1 NFL pick Fernando Mendoza. Indiana is still loaded on defense and got a pair of defensive linemen back in Stephen Daley and Kellan Wyatt in the most recent 5 for 5 judges ruling making them eligible…at least for now. Add in Michigan State WR transfer Nick Marsh and this Hoosier squad is once again ready to turn some heads. They host North Texas on Big Noon Saturday as 39.5 point favorites. #4 USC Trojans 42-26 W vs San Jose State Is USC back? Lots of people think they are with Lincoln Riley finally having the roster to compete led by QB Jayden Maiava. He looked the part in their Week Zero win over San Jose State going 26-29 with 286 yards and a pair of touchdowns. The USC defense looked poor in the fourth quarter getting outscored 23-7, but garbage time is garbage tie and there should not be took many worries about that. The Trojans host Fresno State on Fox on Friday night as 22.5 point favorites in what should be another good game to see where they stack up against a decent Mountain we….damn it Pac-12 team. #5 Penn State Nittany Lions These next three could basically go in any order, but we will give Penn State the benefit of the doubt here. Matt Campbell comes over from Iowa State and brings a large chuck of his former team with him led by QB Rocco Becht. Maybe even bigger will be the return of linebacker Tony Rojas from an ACL injury as the Penn State defense cratered after his loss. Penn State also has impact players in the secondary who transferred from ISU, and should form the backbone of a stout defense. They host Marshall as 23.5 point favorites in Week 1. #6 Washington Huskies After a near disaster of losing their starting QB to LSU requiring the Huskies to get the Big Ten lawyers involved, Jedd Fisch and Washington should be in the upper half of the conference this year. Demond Williams, Jr may be the best dual threat QB in the conference and is coming off of a season where he passed for over 3,000 yards and had 25 touchdowns. Add tough linebacker Jacob Manu who was one of the Big Ten’s best tacklers a season ago and Washington is a playoff dark horse candidate who very easily could be 10-0 headed into their final two games of the season against Indiana and at Oregon. The Huskies open with the Apple Cup against in-state rival and former and current Pac -12 member Washington State (Got that one right!) They are 23.5 point favorites at home over the Cougars. #7 Michigan Wolverines Michigan is an interesting squad as they are getting lots of national hype after their tumutolous offseason and the firing of Sherone Moore. Welcome in former Utah coach Kyle Whittingham who is a very good coach, but how long will it take him to get the Wolverines up to speed under his system. Can Bryce Underwood be better in Year 2 than he was as a freshman where he showed signs of great talent, but then made lots of freshman mistakes? He has lots of talent with him on that side of the ball in running back Jordan Marshall and wide out Andrew Marsh. Wittingham’s teams were always good in the trenches, and if that trend continues at Michigan a playoff run is not out of the question. But the schedule is not very forgiving starting with a Week 2 game vs Oklahoma. Their opener is much easier as Western Michigan comes to the Big House for the Saturday night NBC game as a 27.5 point underdog. #8 Iowa Hawkeyes Welcome to the next group in the squishy middle. These next four or even five could all go in any real order and nobody would say anything. Iowa gets the nod here because despite a very large question mark at QB (Tell me something you haven’t heard before) their lines are absolutely stacked with talent even after losing several players to the NFL. And in the Big Ten, you win in the trenches. Kade Pieper and Trever Lauck are some of the best OL in the conference if not the nation. But who will they be blocking for> It appears at least week 1 will be a rotation of Hank Brown and Jeremy Hecklinski at quarterback…which could be interesting. Iowa opens as a 31.5 point favorite over Northern Illinois at home in what should be an easy start. #9 Minnesota Golden Gophers Minnesota sits right smack in the middle for the time being until we can see just how much Drake Lindsay has improved, and whether or not the offensive and defensive lines really are better. There are a lot of questions with this team, but if they break 75-25 towards the positive then sliding into the top 6 is not out of the question. Of course if the opposite happens the Gophers will be nearing the teens in this list come December. Minnesota opens Thursday night as 42.5 point favorites over Eastern Illinois. But its Week two vs Mississippi State that will tell us a lot more. #10 Illinois Fighting Illini The Fighting Bielema’s are up next and again could definitely have some movement either way in the final rankings. Luke Altmyer is gone and East Carolina transfer Katin Houser takes over. He does not have the pedigree that his predecessor did, so we will see what happens with the Illini offense. They do return a very good offensive line and a strong secondary, so expect them to remain somewhere in the squishy middle. They open Thursday night at home against UAB as 27.5 point favorites. #11 Nebraska Cornhuskers Year four under Matt Rhule looks a lot like the last few. The Huskers will be decent but not great. UNLV transfer Anthony Collandria takes over at QB and was good for the Running Rebels in 2025. But after that they don’t really have any standout names on the rest of the offensive skill positions. The defense should be decent but not quite Blackshirt levels. Frankly Nebraksa has 6-6 or 7-5 written all over them. The schedule starts easy, then gets real in the middle with Indiana, Oregon and Washington in back to back to back weeks, and then Ohio State and Iowa to finish. They open up hosting Ohio as 23.5 point favorites on Saturday. #12 Wisconsin Badgers Another team that could end up in that squishy middle mainly due to their insanely easy schedule. Wisconsin brough in a new QB from Old Dominion in Colton Joseph where he was just as dangerous with his legs as his arm. But can he stay healthy as most Badger QB’s have not for the past half decade? Iowa State transfer Abu Sama should be RB 1 and he will look to add his name to a long hist of Badger greats, but is he that good? The other question will be do they have enough playmakers on defense? But the Badgers just need to be good enough. They avoid Ohio State, Oregon, Michigan and Washington on their schedule. Even assuming losses to USC, Iowa, Penn State and their season opener at Lambeau Field on Sunday against Notre Dame where the Irish are favored by 20.5, and it’s not hard to see a 7-5 season if you can beat the dregs of the conference. #13 UCLA Bruins The Bruins went a complete overhaul in the offseason hiring James Madison coach Bob Chesney. Chesney brought over a ton of players from the Dukes looking to repeat what Curt Cignetti did with Indiana three years ago. Will it work? The Bruins should be better and have a good QB in Nico Iamaleava in year three. But will there just be too many holes to fill to jump into the top half of the conference? We should get real good look at how they will shape up in Week one as they travel up to Berkley to face former Pac-12 rival Cal in a late night game on Saturday as 2.5 point favorites. #14 Northwestern Wildcats Northwestern has been good but not great the last few seasons under David Braun and once again they look to fill that role of potential threat, but not really going anywhere. Chip Kelley is the new OC at Northwestern which should be very interesting to watch. Once their new stadium opens it should also be fun to see a game there. That won’t happen until October when they host Penn State. So for the first two games of the year they are back in their little stadium on the lake. The problem for Northwestern is to give the stadium as much time as possible to open, they get their bye week in Week 2. That means 11 straight weeks of games from September through November with nary a break in sight. Add in a final five game stretch that sees them go at Oregon, home for Iowa, at Ohio State at Minnesota and home for Illinois and well…Northwestern better get those wins early in the year. They open Saturday against South Dakota State as 12.5 point favorites. #15 Rutgers Scarlet Knights The Scarlet Knights will be looking to fight to make a bowl game but not much more in 2026. Gone is Athan Kaliakmanis to the NFL and in his place is Dylan Lonergan who started at Alabama and didn’t play and then went to Boston College where he has one decent season and now is in Piscataway. Ooof. They don’t have any other big names that really moves the needle. They have a middle level conference schedule and avoid both Ohio State and Oregon, but they need to win those mid level games against the Nebraskas, Wisconsins and Northwesterns of the world to get to six wins and Bowl eligibility. They open up against UMass and Joe Harisimiak on Thursdy night as 28.5 point favorites.
#16 Michigan State Spartans Year one of the rebirth of the Pat Fitzgerald career arc begins in East Lansing this weekend. Can he build the Spartans back up into a consistent threat, or will he find out he doesn’t have the juice anymore. Redshirt sophomore Alessio Milivojevic returns for year 2 at the helm of the Spartan offense. He’s one of the few returnees as the Spartans have 66 new players in 2026 so there are a lot of unknowns. Whether Fitzgerald can shape them into a team is still very much a question. The Spartans open on Friday night hosting Toledo as 9.5 point favorites. #17 Purdue Boilermakers It could be another long year in West Lafayette. Barry Odem starts year two in a similar hole from where he started. Ryan Browne returns at QB after a very mid 2025 season. They added some talented transfers from Michigan and Iowa State in the offseason, and have a great tight end in George Burhenn but he has missed time the past two seasons with injuries. They also added former Gopher running back Fame Ijeboi who may be able to help their rushing attack. They also got a gift from the scheduling gods missing all of Oregon, Michigan and Ohio State. But will it be enough to make a bowl? Doubtful. Purdue opens Friday night hosting Indiana State at 35.5 point favorites. #18 Maryland Terrapins Maryland retained Mike Locksley after another subpar season, and it doesn’t look like it will improve much. But remember it’s September, so the Terps should be electric for the first few weeks before crashing and returning to earth. Malik Washington returns at quarterback and is a threat with his legs as well as his arm. He’s the highlight of a Maryland offense that didn’t have much else in 2025. Their defense returns some quality players, and they have a pretty easy schedule avoiding Oregon, Michigan and Indiana. But that November will be brutal ending with Wisconsin and road trips to USC and Penn State to close out the season.