No. 13 Alabama is out of the top 10 of the Associated Press college football poll for the first time in eight years, and Georgia remained No. 1 on Sunday.
Georgia received 57 first-place votes in the AP Top 25. Michigan held at No. 2 with two first-place votes. No. 3 Texas flipped spots with No. 4 Florida State. The Longhorns received three first-place votes, and the Seminoles got one.
After scraping by USF on Saturday, Alabama (2-1) saw its streak of consecutive AP poll appearances ranked in the top 10 snapped at 128. That was the second-longest such streak in the history of the poll, behind Miami‘s 137 from 1985 to 1993.
The Crimson Tide are out of the top 10 for the first time since Sept. 27, 2015. They dropped out of the top 10 that September after losing at Ole Miss but moved back in Oct. 3 and went on to win a national championship.
Georgia now has the longest active run of top-10 rankings with 37.
The ugly 17-3 win against USF marked Alabama’s first game against a non-Power 5 conference opponent since 2007 in which the Tide failed to score at least 20 points. In its previous 42 games against non-Power 5 opponents, Alabama was unbeaten, with an average margin of victory of 40 points.
The Buckeyes will visit the Fighting Irish on Saturday as the centerpiece of a huge schedule of ranked vs. ranked games.
Poll points
Alabama still has the longest streak in the country of consecutive weeks being ranked at 249.
That’s the second best of all time but still a long way behind the record. Nebraska, under Tom Osborne, was ranked for 348 straight weeks from 1981 to 2002.
The next-best active streak behind Alabama’s belongs to Ohio State at 182, although the Buckeyes were not eligible for the first few regular-season polls of the 2020 season.
Georgia’s streak is at 102. Michigan is fourth best at 34, and Utah has the fifth-longest active Top 25 streak at 25.
Moving in, moving out
Kansas State was the only team to fall out of the ranking this week, after losing at Missouri on a 61-yard field goal as time expired.
No. 25 Florida moved back in for the first time since Sept. 24 of last season after upsettingTennessee, which dropped 12 spots to No. 23.
With the Gators back in the AP Top 25, Florida State, Miami and Florida are all ranked for the first time since Sept. 17, 2017.
Conference call
The only two ranked teams in the Big 12 this week are the ones leaving after this season, Texas and Oklahoma.
No. 6 Ohio State at No. 9 Notre Dame: For the second straight year, it’s a top-10 matchup.
No. 15 Ole Miss at No. 13 Alabama: Crimson Tide lead series 9-3 when both are ranked.
No. 22 UCLA at No. 11 Utah: The second meeting with both teams ranked. The first was last year.
No. 19 Colorado at No. 10 Oregon: First regular-season meeting with both teams ranked.
No. 14 Oregon State at No. 21 Washington State: The Beavers and Cougars, the Pac-12’s left-behinds, have played 98 times but never before when both teams were ranked.
No. 24 Iowa at No. 7 Penn State. Three of the past four meetings came when both were ranked.
Coaches’ poll
The top eight remained the same in the AFCA Coaches Poll, with Georgia getting 62 of 64 first-place votes. No. 2 Michigan and No. 4 Ohio State each received one vote. Florida State is No. 3.
CHICAGO — Defenseman Matt Grzelcyk has made the Chicago Blackhawks, agreeing to a $1 million, one-year contract with the team.
Chicago announced the deal on Sunday. Grzelcyk had been with the team in training camp on a personal tryout agreement.
The Blackhawks visit the Florida Panthers for their season opener Tuesday.
The 31-year-old Grzelcyk had one goal and a career-high 39 assists in 82 games for Pittsburgh last season. He also set a career high with a team-leading 101 blocked shots.
Grzelcyk, a Massachusetts native, was selected by Boston in the third round of the 2012 NHL draft. He had 25 goals and 110 assists in 445 games for the Bruins over eight seasons.
Niko Mikkola had an assist on a goal that gave the Florida Panthers an 8-0 lead. Problem was, he had been kicked out of the game a few minutes earlier and nobody noticed.
Florida defeated Tampa Bay 7-0 in the preseason finale for both clubs Saturday night, though the score was irrelevant. There were 65 penalties for 312 minutes on the stat sheet, including 13 game misconduct penalties — seven for Tampa Bay, six for Florida. The penalty count kept rising after the game, as officials were making sure everything that was called got logged.
“I have no idea,” Florida coach Paul Maurice said, when asked what message Tampa Bay was trying to send with its style of play. “I’m not worried about it. Training camp is over. We had some good games … and no one was complaining about ice time by the end of it, so it’s over.”
Florida had 17 power-play chances in the game, by the NHL’s count.
“It got silly. It got stupid by the end of it,” Florida forward Evan Rodrigues said. “It wasn’t really hockey out there.”
The parade to the penalty boxes started about two minutes into the game when Tampa Bay’s Scott Sabourin — who was among six players the Lightning called up for the game — went after Florida’s Aaron Ekblad. Sabourin got a major penalty after playing 19 seconds.
“It made you think there might be something coming,” Florida’s Eetu Luostarinen said, when asked what he thought when he saw the Lightning called up players for the game.
What would have been the eighth Florida goal of the night, midway through the third period, was taken away 15 minutes after Jesper Boqvist scored. Off-ice officials realized that Mikkola couldn’t have had an assist on the play — since he had been ejected earlier in the period.
The teams skated with the scoreboard saying Florida led 8-0 for about five minutes of actual game time before officials informed both teams that the goal had been taken away and Mikkola had to leave the game.
The Lightning took nine penalties and had no shots on goal in the third period.
Saturday’s game came two nights after the teams combined for 49 penalties and 186 minutes in another preseason contest, one the Lightning won 5-2.
Tampa Bay went to three consecutive Stanley Cup Finals from 2020 through 2022, winning two titles in that span. Florida has been to each of the past three Stanley Cup Finals and has won the past two Cups. And there has long been a heated rivalry between the franchises.
“I think anybody that’s been a part of this rivalry would probably look at this box score and A, not be surprised and B, I can’t believe it’s taken this long for something like that to happen,” Lightning coach Jon Cooper said.
PHILADELPHIA — The Flyers rid themselves of defenseman Ryan Ellis‘ contract in a trade with the Sharks, ending his tenure at four games played in four seasons.
Ellis and a conditional sixth-round draft pick were traded to San Jose on Sunday for forward Carl Grundstrom and defenseman Artem Guryev. The condition on the sixth-round pick is that San Jose shall receive the earlier of two picks Philadelphia currently owns in the 2026 sixth round, its own and Columbus‘.
The Flyers now have five picks in the 2026 draft. They own one pick in each of the first three rounds, one in the sixth and one in the seventh round.
Philadelphia thought it acquired one of the NHL’s best defensemen when it landed Ellis from the Nashville Predators ahead of the 2021 season. Ellis was selected by Nashville with the No. 11 pick in the 2009 draft and helped the Predators win the Stanley Cup in 2017. He had 270 points in 562 career games at the time of the trade.
Ellis played four games in 2021 until he suffered a pelvis injury believed to be career-threatening.
The Sharks likely will place Ellis on long-term injured reserve. He has two seasons left on an eight-year, $50 million contract that carries an annual cap hit of $6.25 million through 2027.
Grundstrom scored nine points in 56 games with San Jose last season.