Six Undefeated College Football Teams Remain, and None Look Safe

Five of the top eight teams in the country lost on the same Saturday, and the six undefeated college football teams left standing look nothing like the preseason script. There is no Georgia, no Ohio State, no Notre Dame and, for the first time this season, no unbeaten SEC team at all.

Instead, the list of undefeated college football teams now reads Miami, BYU, Texas Tech, UCLA, Utah and James Madison. Three of them play in the Big 12, one of them won three games last season, and one plays in the Sun Belt, which tells you how strange Week 7 really was.

The undefeated College Football teams by the numbers

Here is where all six stand, using the latest AP poll, their closest call so far, and the one game that scares each of them the most.

The table hides the most important date on the calendar. On Nov. 7, BYU visits Utah in Salt Lake City, and Miami goes to South Bend for a night game against Notre Dame. Somebody in the Holy War has to lose, so this list is guaranteed to shrink to five at most in three weeks.

BYU went from underdog to No. 2 in one night

BYU is the reason this list feels so different. The Cougars beat Notre Dame 28-24 in Provo, ending the Irish streak of 16 double-digit wins, and they did it without star running back LJ Martin. Bear Bachmeier, the sophomore quarterback, scored four touchdowns in three different ways, two on the ground, one through the air, and one on a catch.

Bachmeier made it personal after the game. For anyone who wondered if he remembered Notre Dame’s recruitment, he apparently kept the receipts.

“Out of high school, Notre Dame disrespected me and my family pretty badly, and I wasn’t going to lose to those guys,” Bachmeier told reporters following the win. “There was no way I was going to lose to those guys tonight.”

Kalani Sitake, the BYU head coach, took the less personal route, acknowledging mistakes and crediting his players after the win. The game had been billed as one that could rewrite the playoff picture. It delivered.

Notre Dame got one last shot from the BYU 14, and the Big 12 later admitted a clock error on the final play: one second should have remained. That will not make anyone in South Bend sleep better. BYU earned the No. 2 spot, but a road trip to an unbeaten Utah team is a much tougher exam than a home group in Provo.

UCLA and James Madison share a strange connection

The best story on the list might be a coaching swap. Bob Chesney took James Madison to the College Football Playoff in 2025, then left for UCLA, a program that won just three games last season. The Bruins are 6-0 and beat Wisconsin 17-7 with backup Ty Dieffenbach making his first FBS start in place of the injured Nico Iamaleava.

James Madison replaced Chesney with Billy Napier, whose firing left Florida owing roughly $21 million in buyout payments. Napier is 7-0 in Harrisonburg after a 49-22 win over Georgia State, and running back George Pettaway has four straight 100-yard games. Between them, the coach who built the 2025 Dukes and the coach who replaced him are a combined 13-0 this season.

Utah has looked the shakiest of the Big 12 trio lately. Morgan Scalley, in his first season replacing Kyle Whittingham, watched his team escape Colorado 27-24, and the Utes still have Houston at home on Oct. 24 before BYU comes to town.

Texas Tech is the quietest unbeaten team and the safest bet of the six. Joey McGuire’s Red Raiders avoid BYU and Utah in the regular season, crushed Arizona State 53-25, and have played only one one-score game, the two-point win over Houston.

Miami holds the No. 1 spot, but the Hurricanes needed two overtimes to beat Florida State at home, and their ranking looks rented rather than owned.  A team that sweats out its rivalry game in October has not earned the right to relax before a November trip to Notre Dame, which still has the talent to reshape the race for everyone above it.

The undefeated college football teams that survive November will probably not include more than three of these six. The likeliest survivors are Texas Tech, the winner of the Holy War, and James Madison, which would leave Miami and UCLA as the two fall guys of a season that has stopped paying attention to the preseason rankings.