Alabama Football ranks No. 2 in ESPN's post-spring SP+ projections

ESPN writer Bill Connelly updated his SP+ projections for the 2025 college football season, and Alabama was near the top of the post-spring list, coming in at No. 2 behind only Ohio State.

The Crimson Tide enters Year 2 of the Kalen DeBoer era with a score of 27.9. The Buckeyes led all schools at 29.5, while Penn State (27.7), Georgia (26.9) and Texas (26.4) rounded out the top five. Alabama was one of 12 Southeastern Conference schools among the top 25 in ESPN’s updated SP+ rankings, including four teams from the SEC featured in the top 10.

The SP+ rankings also featured strength of schedule rankings, which had Alabama at No. 11. Oklahoma, which the Tide will welcome to Tuscaloosa in November, led in that category. At 65%, UA has the best odds of any SEC team to go 10-2 or better, per ESPN. Those were the fourth-best odds behind Penn State (82%), Ohio State (77%) and Oregon (73%).

Alabama welcomed back 14 total starters from its 2024 team (6 on offense, 8 on defense). In the SP+ returning production rankings, the Crimson Tide checked in at No. 29 at 64%. UA had the 57th-best offensive returning production (59%) but ranked 13th overall in on the defensive side of the football (69%). Clemson led all teams with 80% returning production.

ESPN’s SP+ projections are based on three factors.

1. Returning production. The returning production numbers are based on rosters I have updated as much as humanly possible to account for transfers and attrition. The combination of last year’s SP+ ratings and adjustments based on returning production makes up about two-thirds of the projections formula.

2. Recent recruiting. This piece informs us of the caliber of a team’s potential replacements (and/or new stars) in the lineup. It is determined by the past few years of recruiting rankings in diminishing order (meaning the most recent class carries the most weight). This is also impacted by the recruiting rankings of incoming transfers, an acknowledgment that the art of roster management is now heavily dictated by the transfer portal.

3. Recent history. Using a sliver of information from the previous four seasons or so gives us a good measure of overall program health.

(One other reminder: SP+ is a tempo- and opponent-adjusted measure of college football efficiency. It is a predictive measure of the most sustainable and predictable aspects of football, not a résumé ranking, and along those lines, these projections aren’t intended to be a guess at what the AP Top 25 will look like at the end of the season. These are simply early offseason power rankings based on the information we have been able to gather.)

Post-Spring SP+ Rankings

1. Ohio State – 29.5
2. Alabama – 27.9
3. Penn State – 27.7
4. Georgia – 26.9
5. Texas – 26.4
6. Notre Dame – 24.9
7. Oregon – 24/7
8. Clemson – 23.3
9. LSU – 22.1
10. Michigan – 21.5
11. Ole Miss – 19.8
12. Miami – 18.8
13. Tennessee – 18.4
14. Florida – 17.3
15. Texas A&M – 17.2
16. Oklahoma – 16.5
17. South Carolina – 16.1
18. Kansas State – 15.6
19. Illinois – 14.3
20. SMU – 13.1
21. Missouri – 12.5
22. Arizona State – 12.2
23. Indiana – 12.2
24. Louisville – 12.1
25. Auburn – 11.8

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