The Penn State Nittany Lions have their eyes on potentially winning a national championship this season and a lot of voters in The Associated Press poll believe it can happen, too. While the Texas Longhorns secured the No.

Penn State is one of six Big Ten teams in the AP preseason top 25. Illinois is ranked No. 12, Michigan came in at No. 14, and Indiana sits at No. 20. For the fifth consecutive season, I’m excited to be an AP top 25 voter. I ranked Penn State No. 1 on my preseason ballot, followed by Clemson, Texas, Ohio State and Notre Dame.

The Nittany Lions should be strong defensively again. This team has talented returners everywhere you look. And now, they've got a good omen: Penn State opened the season ranked No. 2 in the AP Top-25 preseason poll. Why's that matter?

Texas edged Penn State for the No. 1 ranking and earned the top spot in the preseason Top 25 poll for the first time in program history.

No. 2 marks Penn State’s highest preseason ranking in the James Franklin era, though the program has outperformed its preseason spot just four times in Franklin’s 11 years. The Lions went from unranked to fifth in 2016, 15th to 10th in 2019, unranked to 11th in 2022 and eighth to fourth in 2024.

When the Associated Press' preseason college football poll came out on Monday, ESPN analyst Paul Finebaum did not like where Penn State appeared.

The longer Penn State quarterback Drew Allar weighed his options, the more he thought how sweet it would be to bring a national championship to Happy Valley. After No. 2 Penn State’s down-to-the-wire loss to Notre Dame in the College Football Playoff semifinal last season,