College football rankings: Tennessee jumps Georgia in CBS Sports 131 ahead of crucial SEC East showdown

While the traditional polls haven’t made many changes at the top of the updated college football rankings, our experts at CBS Sports and 247Sports have made another change to the top 3 of the CBS Sports 131. After an impressive 44-6 win over Kentucky in Week 9, Tennessee has relegated Georgia to second place behind top-ranked Ohio State.

The order of No. 1 Ohio State, No. 2 Georgia, and No. 3 Tennessee remained in place after last week, in what was an uncharacteristic lack of adjustment after the top three in the first eight CBS Sports 131 had seven different versions in the 2022 season. Now, two weeks after Tennessee moved up to 3rd place after beating Alabama, Tennessee is once again ahead of an SEC opponent.

That shake at the top underscores the excitement and anticipation for Georgia and Tennessee’s meeting this Saturday on the SEC for the CBS Game of the Week. The Vols may have jumped above the Bulldogs in our ranking and could even rank higher if the college football The playoff selection committee will release its first standings Tuesday, but the celebration of those accomplishments will only be temporary if Georgia can defend home territory and its place in the SEC East with a win on Saturday.

Further down the rankings, both Illinois, now No. 12, and Kansas State, now No. 15, jumped five spots after wins in Week 9, while Oklahoma State and Wake Forest fell to the fringes of the top 20 after losses. For more information on the biggest weekly changes in the CBS Sports 131, see the Mover’s Report under the top 25 chart.

College football pundits from CBS Sports and 247Sports contribute ballots each week that are averaged for our rankings. You can see the top 25 below and 26-131 on our rankings page.

Biggest Mover

• No. 34 Notre-Dame (+15): The Fighting Irish have found success – and even an identity – by riding ground play and strong defense. After an away win over Syracuse, Notre Dame now sits 5-3 and two wins against teams our voters place in the top 25. It also has losses against Stanford and Marshall, so there’s a cap on how high Notre Dame will go, but this team is definitely moving in the right direction.
• No. 26 UCF (+13): We saw UCF take a big drop in the rankings after losing at ECU last week, but a win over Cincinnati put the Knights back exactly where they were before that loss: knocking on the top 25 door.
• No. 43 Louisville (+10): With the loss of Wake Forest, Louisville finally has a quality win that has voters urging them up after the Cardinals spent much of the early weeks falling in the rankings. With a reasonable future schedule, it’s possible Louisville could end the year closer to the top-30 range that matched preseason expectations.
• no 19 State of Oklahoma (-10): The Cowboys are dealing with plenty of injury woes and maybe even a bruised ego after losing 48-0 at Kansas State, one of the worst losses for the program in recent years. Oklahoma State isn’t out of the Big 12 race just yet, but it needs to get healthy and rack up wins again to contend for either spot in the conference championship game.
• No. 33 Kentucky (-10): Offensive problems prevented Kentucky from matching Tennessee in Knoxville as star quarterback Will Levis had one of his worst performances of the season with three interceptions.
• #31 Cincinnati (-12): A wild finish ended in a disappointing away loss at UCF, giving coach Luke Fickell and the Bearcats a 19-game winning streak in the American Athletic Conference game.
• No. 46 South Carolina (-20): It’s a dramatic drop for a team that spent two weeks climbing the rankings but suffered a stunning defeat on Saturday. Our Missouri-based voters had that in mind as they fielded the Gamecocks against other three-losting teams.

Check out the rest of CBS Sports 131: Teams ranked 26-131