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BREAKING: Penn State football falls out of top five in AP Poll following loss to Ohio State

How far did Penn State football drop in the national rankings after Saturday’s loss to Ohio State? We now have our answer.

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© Caroline Bixler / Basic Blues Nation, 2024.

For the first time this season, Penn State football enters Sunday with a one in the loss column after falling to Ohio State 20-13 inside Beaver Stadium Saturday afternoon. The Nittany Lions were looking for only their second win over a top-five opponent in 11 seasons under James Franklin. Instead, they again came out on the wrong side at the hands of the Buckeyes.

Unlike years past, the loss doesn’t kill the Nittany Lions’ postseason aspirations. Penn State still has a viable path to next month’s College Football Playoff and perhaps even to host a home playoff game.

We got our first glimpse at the national perception of a one-loss Penn State football team with the release of the Week 11 AP Poll Sunday afternoon. The Nittany Lions fell out of the top five, dropping three stops to No. 6. The Coaches Poll has the Blue and White ranked No.7 following the loss to the Buckeyes.

The full AP top 25 is as follows:
  1. Oregon
  2. Georgia
  3. Ohio State
  4. Miami
  5. Texas
  6. Penn State
  7. Tennessee
  8. Indiana
  9. BYU
  10. Notre Dame
  11. Alabama
  12. Boise State
  13. SMU
  14. LSU
  15. Texas A&M
  16. Ole Miss
  17. Iowa State
  18. Army
  19. Clemson
  20. Washington State
  21. Colorado
  22. Kansas State
  23. Pitt
  24. Vanderbilt
  25. Louisville

We’ll learn where Penn State football stands in the eyes of the College Football Playoff committee when the first official rankings are released this coming Tuesday.

“We’ve got to do a great job making sure we come in tomorrow, make the corrections, but then Sunday night, we’ve got to flush it and move on to Washington,” James Franklin said in his postgame press conference Saturday. “We can’t allow one loss to turn into two.

“The reality of college football is everything is still ahead of us. And we’ve got to do a great job of making the corrections, eliminating the things that were unforced errors that happened today. And then we’ve got to find a way to get a win next week at home, and everything is still in front of us.”

Penn State stays at home this week, hosting Washington in primetime for the annual White Out game.



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Matt is a co-owner and Editor in Chief of Basic Blues Nation. Launched in 2022, Basic Blues Nation is one of the fastest-growing websites covering all Penn State athletics, with over 3.5 million readers in 2023. Matt is also a credentialed member of the Penn State football beat, and is a member of the Football Writers Association of America.

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