2013 Pre-Season Football Rankings

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Football
Phil Steele Projects Buckeyes at No. 2 in Preseason AP Poll
By Brandon Castel

The start of the 2013 college football season is a lot further away than most people would care to think about.

The Buckeyes don’t open their second season under head coach Urban Meyer until August 31 when they host Buffalo – who replaced Vanderbilt on the schedule – at Ohio Stadium in Columbus.

There will be ample excitement, as there typically is, surrounding the Ohio State football program this season, maybe more than there has been in years. The Buckeyes are coming off a perfect 12-0 season a year ago, but one in which they were banned from all postseason play.

They finished No. 3 in the final AP poll for the 2012 season, but had to watch as Alabama mopped up Notre Dame for its second-straight BCS national championship.

The Crimson Tide will almost certainly open as the heavy favorites for a three-peat in Tuscaloosa, but highly respected football prognosticator Phil Steele has the Buckeyes coming in right behind Alabama at No. 2 in the preseason AP poll this fall.

At least that is what he projected in his special to ESPN.com on Thursday.

“Most AP voters usually look at a couple of criteria when they evaluate a team for the upcoming season. First, they look at the number of returning starters the team has coming back, particularly at the offensive skill positions,” Steele wrote.

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