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Montana New No.1 in Coaches Poll
SPARTANBURG, S.C. – It only took Montana one week into the 2010 season to claim the No. 1 ranking in the Football Championship Subdivision Coaches Poll. The Grizzlies received 16 first-place votes and 662 points overall. Montana spent three weeks last season atop the poll.

Montana is coming off a 73-2 victory over Western State, in which the Grizzlies defense held their opponent to under 100 total yards of offense and tied an NCAA record with four interceptions returned for touchdowns.

Southern Illinois jumped three spots to claim second in the poll after a 70-7 victory over Quincy last week. The Salukis received 598 total points to finish ahead of Appalachian State with 585 points and a first-place vote.

The preseason No. 1 Villanova Wildcats fell to fourth in the polls after losing 31-24 to cross-town rival Temple. The Wildcats received eight first-place votes and 579 points overall. New Hampshire finished fifth in the voting to round out the top-five.

The biggest jump in the rankings was made by Jacksonville State, as they received two first-place votes and moved 11 spots to No. 6. The Gamecocks pulled off the biggest upset in the first week of football with a 49-48 double-overtime thriller against Ole Miss. Jacksonville State outscored the Rebels 21-3 in the fourth quarter to force the overtime, and the Gamecocks opted for the two-point conversion in the second overtime to capture the win. It was the first time the Gamecocks have defeated a Football Bowl Subdivision since they beat Arkansas State in 2001. The 21-point comeback was also the largest come-from-behind victory for Jacksonville State in school history.

Rounding out the Top 10 are Richmond, Elon, South Dakota State and McNeese State.

New to the poll this week are Massachusetts (No. 20) and North Dakota State (No. 21). Prairie View A&M, Cal-Poly and Holy Cross all fell out of the rankings.

Nine conferences are represented in the poll. The Colonial Athletic Association leads the way with seven teams, followed by the Big Sky with five ranked teams. The Missouri Valley has four teams in the Top 25, and the Southern, Southland and Ohio Valley Conferences each have two representatives. The Mid-Eastern Atlantic and Big South Conferences, along with the Patriot League, have one team in this week’s poll.

FCS Coaches Poll is based exclusively on a voting panel of head coaches in the FCS under the cooperation of the Collegiate Commissioners Association (CCA) and the American Football Coaches Association (AFCA) and is administered by the Southern Conference.

2010 FCS Coaches Week 1 Poll (September 6, 2010)
Team (No. 1 Votes) Record Points Last Week
1. Montana (16) 1-0 662 2
2. Southern Illinois 1-0 598 5
3. Appalachian State (1) 1-0 585 3
4. Villanova (8) 0-1 579 1
5. New Hampshire 1-0 518 9
6. Jacksonville State (2) 1-0 516 17
7. Richmond 0-1 478 6
8. Elon 0-1 443 7
9. South Dakota State 0-0 426 10
10. McNeese State 1-0 378 11
11. James Madison 1-0 357 15
12. Stephen F. Austin 0-1 353 8
13. Northern Iowa 0-0 336 13
14. William & Mary 0-1 285 4
15. Eastern Washington 0-1 273 14
16. South Carolina State 0-1 264 12
17. Delaware 1-0 234 19
18. Liberty 1-0 216 20
19. Weber State 0-1 184 18
20. Massachusetts 1-0 163 NR
21. North Dakota State 1-0 138 NR
22. Eastern Illinois 0-1 134 16
23. Montana State 1-0 115 24
24. Northern Arizona 1-0 107 23
25. Colgate 1-0 81 22

Others receiving votes (points in parentheses): Prairie View A&M (79), Holy Cross (67), Cal-Poly (47), Illinois State (28), Penn (23), Missouri State (17), Georgia Southern (12), Harvard (11), Albany (9), Furman (9), Texas State (8), Arkansas-Pine Bluff (6), Bethune-Cookman (5), Southern Utah (5), Tennessee State (5), Southeastern Louisiana (4), Alabama State (3), Florida A&M (3), Gardner-Webb (3), Austin Peay (2), Dayton (2), Bucknell (1), Butler (1), UC Davis (1), Youngstown State (1)

Wow voters must have really punished Nova for them to get 8 first place votes and finish the week behind 2 teams that didn't get a single first place vote.

My notes:

I continue to love the fact that JSU sky rocketed up. They deserved it. I had them 11th in my preseason ranking and have them 5th now. They are a very good team.

W&M is still too high. I would drop them out of the top 20 and put UMASS around 16-20.

NDSU needs to be in the top 20. I think their defense is for real. The offense needs work but defeating a FBS school is a big deal and deserves to be rewarded more.

SmallCollegeFBFan wrote:My notes:

I continue to love the fact that JSU sky rocketed up. They deserved it. I had them 11th in my preseason ranking and have them 5th now. They are a very good team.

W&M is still too high. I would drop them out of the top 20 and put UMASS around 16-20.

NDSU needs to be in the top 20. I think their defense is for real. The offense needs work but defeating a FBS school is a big deal and deserves to be rewarded more.

Pre-season polls are beauty/popularity contests....nothing more...

They unduely influence regular season polls...people hate admitting they are wrong, and won't drop teams too far with a loss...won't raise teams too far with a win...

I know I'm like a broken record (talk about a dated reference)...but polls should not start until at least week 4...so they can be based on some facts...

UNI31f wrote:Wow voters must have really punished Nova for them to get 8 first place votes and finish the week behind 2 teams that didn't get a single first place vote.

This is actually the first poll after real games, so I didn't really move teams up and down, just placed them where I thought they should be. Nova beat Temple last year, is Nova as good as last year? Not really punishing them, just basing their placement on how they compare to last year playing the same opponent.

Gil Dobie wrote:

UNI31f wrote:Wow voters must have really punished Nova for them to get 8 first place votes and finish the week behind 2 teams that didn't get a single first place vote.

This is actually the first poll after real games, so I didn't really move teams up and down, just placed them where I thought they should be. Nova beat Temple last year, is Nova as good as last year? Not really punishing them, just basing their placement on how they compare to last year playing the same opponent.

I don't mind them being where they are now.

My thinking is how low did some people rate them that they have 8 first place votes (2nd and 3rd have one total) and finish 4th in the poll. There had to be a lot of voters dropping them to about the 10 range

UNI31f wrote:

Gil Dobie wrote:
This is actually the first poll after real games, so I didn't really move teams up and down, just placed them where I thought they should be. Nova beat Temple last year, is Nova as good as last year? Not really punishing them, just basing their placement on how they compare to last year playing the same opponent.

I don't mind them being where they are now.

My thinking is how low did some people rate them that they have 8 first place votes (2nd and 3rd have one total) and finish 4th in the poll. There had to be a lot of voters dropping them to about the 10 range

What's more perplexing is U Mass being rated below William & Mary

Gil Dobie wrote:

UNI31f wrote: I don't mind them being where they are now.

My thinking is how low did some people rate them that they have 8 first place votes (2nd and 3rd have one total) and finish 4th in the poll. There had to be a lot of voters dropping them to about the 10 range

What's more perplexing is U Mass being rated below William & Mary

which is proof that polls are garbage at this point. There is no reason we should be ahead of UMass after they just beat us at this point. Totally agree with Col Hogan who already said polls shouldn't even sniff the playground until at least 4 weeks in.