Roster talent rankings: College football teams with the best players in 2018

Based strictly on player recruiting rankings, these are the best rosters in college football

By Chip Patterson

Feb 14, 2018 at 10:03 am ET • 1 min read

Unlike its basketball counterpart, college football has not been a sport that favors Cinderella stories. Teams exceed expectations and surprise us every season, but when it comes time to crown a champion, the schools that are in position to win it all are the ones who have recruited four- and five-star players at a high level over a five-year window.

In the College Football Playoff era, 11 of the 16 available spots have been awarded to four teams: Alabama, Clemson, Ohio State and Oklahoma. Each of these programs has recruited at or near the top of their conference and average at top-15 recruiting class in the College Football Playoff era. Additionally, the teams occupying the other five playoff bids of the era (Georgia, Florida State, Oregon, Washington and Michigan State) all fall in the top 25 of our rolling talent rankings.

Now that 2018 National Signing Day is in the books, those rankings (a five-year average of the 247Sports Composite team rankings) can be updated to give a preview of the most talented teams in college football for 2018.

These rankings are raw: They don't take player attrition, player development, transfers or other factors into consideration -- our partners at 247Sports cover that with Team Talent Composite, which is updated each August as rosters are finalized. Our goal here today is to use a snapshot of recruiting success over five cycles to establish some tiers heading into next season.

Team	Conference	Five-year average	2014	2015	2016	2017	2018
Alabama	SEC	2.2	1	1	1	1	7
Ohio State	Big Ten	3.6	3	7	4	2	2
Georgia	SEC	5.0	8	6	7	3	1
Florida State	ACC	5.2	4	3	2	6	11
USC	Pac-12	5.6	10	2	8	4	4
LSU	SEC	6.4	2	5	3	7	15
Auburn	SEC	9.0	6	9	9	9	12
Clemson	ACC	11.6	18	8	10	16	6
Notre Dame	INDIE	12.0	11	13	15	11	10
Tennessee	SEC	12.4	7	4	14	17	20
Texas A&M	SEC	12.8	5	11	19	12	17
Texas	Big 12	13.4	17	10	11	26	3
Oklahoma	Big 12	13.4	14	15	21	8	9
Florida	SEC	13.4	9	21	13	10	14
Penn State	Big Ten	15.6	24	14	20	15	5
Miami	ACC	16.2	12	26	22	13	8
UCLA	Pac-12	16.2	19	12	12	20	18
Michigan	Big Ten	17.8	20	38	5	5	21
Ole Miss	SEC	19.8	15	17	6	30	31
Oregon	Pac-12	20.0	21	16	28	19	16
South Carolina	SEC	20.2	16	19	26	21	19
Stanford	Pac-12	21.2	13	24	16	14	39
Washington	Pac-12	25.6	37	27	29	22	13
Michigan State	Big Ten	26.6	25	22	18	36	32
Mississippi State	SEC	27.0	35	18	31	24	27