Florida's FPI ranking slips while other metrics improve
NCAAF College Football News, Photos, Stats, Scores, Schedule & Videos...
Florida football opened up its 2026 SEC schedule with a big road win against the Auburn Tigers at Jordan-Hare Stadium on Saturday night, giving the Gators a perfect 3-0 start to the Jon Sumrall era. However, despite the victory, the Orange and Blue slipped a spot in ESPN's Football Power Index rankings but still saw improvements in the other metrics.
The FPI measures team strength and is meant to be the best predictor of a team's performance for the rest of the season; it shows how many points above or below average a team is. Each team is assigned a rating that measures its true strength on a net points scale as well as expected point margin versus an average opponent on a neutral field.
Projected results are based on 20,000 simulations of the season using FPI and the schedule. Here is a look at how Florida's numbers shake out after Week 3's results.
Where Florida football ranks in ESPN's FPI after Week 3
Florida fell one spot to No. 16 in ESPN's FPI rankings after the Week 3 win, but their rating improved by 0.2 points to 16.4. Sumrall and Co. now sits between No. 15 Utah (16.5) and No. 17 Texas Tech (15.8) in the standings.
The FPI predicts the Gators to finish this fall's regular-season schedule with a 7.9-4.2 record and now has a microscopic 0.1% chance of winning out — still better than the 0% it had before. Florida's chances of finishing with six wins or more got a 9.7% boost to 92.3%, while the odds of winning the conference increased by 1.3% to 3.1%.
The Gators moved up from 18.9% to a 26.2% chance of making the College Football Playoff, along with a 2.8% chance of reaching the national championship game and a 1.0% chance of bringing home the national title — improvements of 0.7% and 0.3%, respectively.
Football Power Index top 25 rankings after Week 3
- Ohio State Buckeyes
- Texas Longhorns
- Georgia Bulldogs
- Notre Dame Fighting Irish
- Indiana Hoosiers
- Miami Hurricanes
- Alabama Crimson Tide
- LSU Tigers
- Oregon Ducks
- Tennessee Volunteers
- Penn State Nittany Lions
- Texas A&M Aggies
- Ole Miss Rebels
- Oklahoma Sooners
- Utah Utes
- Florida Gators
- Texas Tech Red Raiders
- USC Trojans
- BYU Cougars
- Michigan Wolverines
- Nebraska Cornhuskers
- Mississippi State Bulldogs
- Louisville Cardinals
- Auburn Tigers
- Pittsburgh Panthers
Follow us @GatorsWire on X, formerly known as Twitter, as well as Bluesky, and like our page on Facebook to follow ongoing coverage of Florida Gators news, notes and opinions.
This article originally appeared on Gators Wire: Florida's FPI ranking slips while other metrics improve
More at NCAAF College Football News, Photos, Stats, Scores, Schedule & Videos