The latest of numerous crucial Saturdays to come across the remainder of the 2023 College Football season resulted in some shake ups that will surely come to fruition Sunday when the new AP Top 25 is released. Expect to see multiple teams falling out and plenty of movement within the College Football Rankings based on results from Week 7.

Many of the top teams in last week’s rankings faced inferior opponents and were able to meet expectations to varying degrees. That left Washington as the biggest winner of the week following an epic home win against rival Oregon. The Huskies entered in a position where everyone respected their offense but no one was sure what to make of the quality of competition they faced to this point in the season. However, now that the Huskies have traded haymakers with the Ducks, there should be little doubt that AP voters have reasons to erase prior doubts and start to compare Washington with the best teams the country has to offer.

The nature of that back-and-forth affair will lead to a high floor for Oregon’s fall with more questions about whether the Ducks should have gone for all three of those failed fourth-down attempts than whether Dan Lanning’s squad is one of the 10 best teams in the country. So while Oregon will be a candidate to drop after the loss, we’re not projecting it will fall outside of the top 10 in the new college football rankings. 

Here’s how we project the new AP Top 25 to look after Week 7 in college football: 

1. Georgia (Last week — 1): There will likely be more first-place votes that drift to Michigan, but there won’t be enough changes to cause an adjustment at the top spot. The Bulldogs may have trailed 7-0 early and fallen well short of expectations with a 37-20 win over Vanderbilt, but at 7-0, there will be enough voter inertia to keep Georgia at No. 1. 

2. Michigan (2): The Wolverines followed up a 52-10 road win at Minnesota with a 52-7 home win against Indiana. Though it took a while for the offense to get rolling, the final score is going to attract enough attention to reignite the debate for No. 1. 

3. Ohio State (3): With a limited roster due to injuries and a series history of stumbling in West Lafayette, Indiana, there was some upset alert interest prior to kickoff against Purdue. Those concerns were squashed quickly by Ohio State’s defense. By the end of the game, the offense poured on enough points to get some voter respect with a 41-7 win. 

4. Florida State (4): Keon Coleman gets the star of the weekend for the Seminoles as he builds his argument as not only the best wide receiver in the game but potentially the best in the forthcoming 2024 NFL Draft class. Coleman totaled nine receptions for 140 yards and a touchdown in the 41-3 win over Syracuse.

5. Washington (7): Michael Penix Jr. positioned himself as the new Heisman Trophy frontrunner after the huge win over Oregon, and voter overreaction will lead to a jump that could be as high as No. 4 given the quality victory.  

6. Oklahoma (5): The Sooners were off in Week 7 and will be back in action next Saturday against UCF. 

7. Penn State (6): There’s no punishment here for Penn State as much as there is no bonus for running it up on UMass in a 63-0 win. The Nittany Lions will get a chance to make their case to be a top-five team next week in their much-anticipated showdown with Ohio State. 

8. Texas (9): The Longhorns were off in Week 7 and will be back in action next Saturday at Houston. 

9. Oregon (8): This might be a little high for the Ducks’ landing spot, but it’s hard to look at the game with honest eyes — whether you watched every second or just scanned the box score like many AP voters do — and think Oregon did not meet expectations in the tough road spot. The Ducks outgained the Huskies, had more first downs and nearly the same yards-per-play numbers. However, going 0 for 3 on fourth down in key spots and the missed field goal at the end of regulation stood as differences in a three-point defeat. 

10. Alabama (11): If there were more viable top-10 candidates, the Crimson Tide might fall behind in the pecking order after a 24-21 win against Arkansas that will not do a lot to attract the attention of AP voters. But as a one-loss team with a win against Ole Miss and only one loss to Texas, the profile and pedigree of the Tide help this group maintain its rankings position. 

11. North Carolina (12): An upset-minded Miami team showed up to Chapel Hill, North Carolina, and even held a halftime lead before Drake Maye and Tez Walker took hold of the game in the second half for an impressive 41-31 Tar Heels win to improve to 6-0 for the first time since 1997.

12. Ole Miss (13): The Rebels were off in Week 7 and will be back in action next Saturday at Auburn. 

13. Notre Dame (21): It’s tough to figure out where the Fighting Irish will land, but the win against USC was definitive (48-20), and given the Trojans entered the game undefeated, that should lead to a huge bump in the rankings. 

14. USC (10): Caleb Williams can take the Trojans pretty far … just not far enough to beat a top-15 team on the road. USC is an incomplete team, and with its first loss of the season, it should take a fall in the rankings. 

15. Oregon State (15): A convincing win against UCLA at home could lead to a slight bump up, but a hard ceiling is provided by the loss to Washington State, which took a bad 44-6 loss to Arizona in Week 7. 

16. Utah (16): In taking care of business against Cal, the Utes improved to 5-1 and should hold their similar position in the new rankings.  

17. Duke (17): No Riley Leonard? No problem. Duke’s defense is the strongest side of Mike Elko’s squad, and it put the clamps on NC State to improve to 5-1 with its lone loss coming to Notre Dame.   

18. Louisville (14): There’s nothing more disappointing for Louisville fans than following up an epic win against Notre Dame with a loss to a Pitt side that had not defeated an FBS team prior to Saturday. But AP voters will only see one loss and a win against Notre Dame when sorting out teams outside of the top 15, and they will ultimately keep the Cardinals ranked pretty high despite the bad loss.  

19. Tennessee (19): It wasn’t always pretty, but the Volunteers were able to grind out a significant 20-13 win against Texas A&M behind a strong defensive effort. While the point total is not what’s expected week-to-week with Josh Huepel’s offense, the result against the Aggies was close to the projected margin and won’t result in too much shake up. 

20. LSU (22): Whether Saturday’s 48-18 win against Auburn is reflective more of LSU’s defense improving or Auburn’s own offensive shortcomings won’t matter too much to AP voters, who will see that LSU handled its business with authority against an inferior opponent in Death Valley. 

21. Missouri (NR): No better way to bounce back from LSU ripping out a win from your hands than doing the same on the road at Kentucky. The Tigers’ 38-21 victory will put Eli Drinkwitz’s squad back into the rankings, falling just behind the LSU team that knocked them off last week. 

22. Air Force (NR): Now at 6-0 after a 34-27 win against a Wyoming squad that was surging, Air Force has positioned itself in the conversation of teams that could earn a spot in the New Year’s Six should the Falcons be able to hold their leverage in the Mountain West and finish the season as conference champions. 

23. Tulane (NR): The Green Wave should break into the rankings after a 31-21 win at Memphis to improve to 5-1. Their the lone loss is against a top-15 Ole Miss team. 

24. James Madison (NR): Sitting at 6-0, James Madison won handily, 41-13 against Georgia Southern team that had just one loss coming into the game. 

25. UCLA (18): If the Bruins end up ranked at all after taking their second loss, it’s more for a lack of obvious options than a consensus belief in UCLA as a top-25 team after the road loss at Oregon State. Plenty of teams will be moving into the rankings ahead of UCLA, and some like Wisconsin, West Virginia, Maryland and Texas A&M all lost in positions where they could have jumped ahead in line. 

Projected to drop out: No. 19 Washington State, No. 23 Kansas, No. 24 Kentucky, No. 25 Miami