In a way, the 2016 season will pick up where 2015 left off: Alabama is No. 1 and Clemson is 2.
The defending national champion Crimson Tide is the No. 1 team in The Associated Press preseason Top 25 for the fifth time overall and third time under coach Nick Saban.
The Tide received 33 of 61 first-place votes from the media panel and 1,469 points in the poll released Sunday. No. 2 Clemson, which lost a thrilling College Football Playoff championship game to Alabama in January, received 16 first-place votes and 1,443 points. This is the first time since 1992 that the teams that ended the previous season at Nos. 1 and 2 in the AP poll began the next season in the same spots. Miami and Washington did it that season.
Oklahoma is No. 3 in the preseason poll and received four first-place votes. No. 4 Florida State had five first-place votes. No. 5 LSU, No. 6 Ohio State and No. 7 Michigan all received one first-place vote. A year after Ohio State became the first unanimous preseason No. 1 in the history of the AP poll, seven teams received first-place votes, the most in the preseason since 1998.
Stanford is No. 8, followed by No. 9 Tennessee and No. 10 Notre Dame.