CBS Sports 128 rankings: Alabama looking to go wire-to-wire No. 1 – CBS sports.com (blog)

Alabama Crimson Tide
is on the verge of making college football rankings history, again.

We haven’t done the CBS Sports 128 forever, but even in its short history there has never been a wire-to-wire No. 1.

In the AP Top 25 era, only
Florida State Seminoles
(1999) and
Southern California Trojans
(2004) have accomplished wire-to-wire No. 1 rankings, though oddsmakers are currently favoring Alabama’s 2016 team to join them should the Tide beat
Florida Gators
in the SEC Championship Game and then win the College Football Playoff after a one-month layoff.

It’s just the latest rankings-related history for Nick Saban and the Tide. Saturday’s SEC title game will be Saban’s 48th career game coaching Alabama as the AP No. 1 team, the most games coached as No. 1 at any one school. Saban has also won more games with a No. 1-ranked Alabama team (42) than any other coach with any one school in college football history — Woody Hayes and Bobby Bowden are tied for second (40).

If all the success makes you want to doubt the Tide’s chance to finish the job in 2016, remember that Saban is 42-5 in games coaching a No. 1-ranked Alabama team.

College football experts from CBS Sports — and for the first time this year, partner 247Sports — contribute ballots each week, which are averaged together for our rankings. You can see the top-25 below, and 26-128 on our rankings page.

Biggest movers

• Virginia Tech (+8): When you hang half-a-hundred on your rival like the Hokies did against
  Virginia Cavaliers
  , voters take notice. Justin Fuente’s bunch takes the field Saturday against Clemson looking to play spoiler.
• LSU (+8): Coach O bump? Voters are feeling LSU after the rout of Texas A&M and the windows-down, music-pumping hire of Ed Orgeron.
• West Virginia (+7):
  Skyler Howard
  and the Mountaineers quietly pulled things back together with a solid win against
  Iowa State Cyclones
  . Not allowing the Oklahoma loss to linger helped WVU rebound in the rankings.
• Navy (+5): Navy didn’t punt once as it threw 75 on the board against
  Southern Methodist Mustangs
  to lock up a spot in the American Athletic Conference title game.
• Louisville (-6): It’s a sad Monday morning in Louisville, where that 9-3 record might match preseason expectations but falls well short of what cold have been for the Cardinals in 2016.
• Nebraska (-9): Once up in the top 1o, Nebraska really could have used that last win in the rivalry game against
  Iowa Hawkeyes
  to close the regular season instead of getting blasted by the Hawkeyes.

Check out the rest of the CBS Sports 128: Teams ranked 26-128