After a dominant 41-19 win against Arizona, BYU is now ranked No. 13 in the Associated Press top 25 poll.
According to CougarStats, this is BYU's 283rd appearance in the AP Poll, 35th most in the nation. Since BYU's first appearance in 1974, it has the 24th most appearances.
The Athlon Sports College Football preseason magazine had the Cougars ranked 68th prior to the season.
At No. 13, BYU is nestled between 5-1 Notre Dame, which demolished Stanford on Saturday, and 5-1 Texas A&M, which had a bye-week.
There are seven one-loss teams and five unbeaten teams ahead of BYU in the poll. In total, there are 11 undefeated teams remaining in college football.
11 undefeated teams remain 👀💯
— FOX College Football (@CFBONFOX) October 13, 2024
Repost if your team is still undefeated through Week 7 🙌 pic.twitter.com/lgKkubwazv
Where the Cougars stand in other ballots
- Two AP Top 25 voter ballots have BYU at No. 6
- One AP Top 25 voter ballot has BYU at No. 7.
- Three AP Top 25 voter ballots have BYU at No. 8.
- Four AP Top 25 voter ballots have BYU at No. 9.
- Only one AP Top 25 voter has BYU outside of the top 15.
The Cougars are 6-0 for the sixth time in program history, most recently in 2020 during the COVID-19 season. Prior to that, it was the 2008 team led by the juggernaut offense of Max Hall, Harvey Unga, Dennis Pitta and Austin Collie.
The Cougars are one of three ranked Big 12 teams, along with No. 9 Iowa State and No. 17 Kansas State.
In addition to its No. 13 ranking, BYU is atop the Big 12 Conference right now followed by Iowa State and Texas Tech, who are also undefeated in conference play thus far.
The current Big 12 standings look a bit different than the preseason poll. Compare the side-by-side images below:
Greg Wrubell reported that teams picked by the media to finish first through fifth in the Big 12 currently have a combined conference record of 3-11.
These teams include: Utah (now 9th in Big 12), Kansas State (now 5th), Oklahoma State (now 14th), Kansas (now last) and Arizona (now 10th).
Now with all of that being said, here's the bottom line — in six weeks time, BYU went from 13th to 1st in the Big 12.
Looking ahead
Six games down, six to go for the Cougars and they will look to avoid a repeat of last year's finish to the season.
After going 4-2 the first half of the season, BYU finished 1-5.
The Cougars have started this season 6-0. A 1-5 finish seems highly unlikely based on the team's strong start and its high hopes of making it to the Big 12 Championship and maybe even the College Football Playoff.
The odds seem to be in BYU's favor. Its remaining opponents are a combined 5-13 in Big 12 play and its next three opponents are a combined 0-8 in their last eight games.