Washington State left out of preseason coaches poll

The first Amway Coaches Poll of the 2017 football season came out Thursday, and Washington State is on the outside looking in, but by a slim margin.

The Cougs received the most votes of any team left out of the top 25 and were the fifth ranked Pac-12 team. The coaches appear to be on the same page as the Orlando Sentinel who also ranked Washington State as the 26th best team going into 2017.

All four conference foes that appeared in the poll will also play against WSU this season. The two division favorites, USC (4) and UW (7), got plenty of respect in the initial poll. While Stanford (14) and Utah (25) appear a bit higher than I expected considering how much production they lost on both sides of the ball. The Cougs’ week two opponent, Boise State (29), also just missed out on making the poll.

ESPN also released its initial college football power rankings, which thought a bit higher of WSU. The Cougs came in at no. 24 while Utah was not included.

The AP is yet to release its preseason poll but history tell us it’s unlikely that WSU will be among the top 25. Only twice in school history, in 2002 and 1952, has the Washington State football team been included in the first AP poll of the season.

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