USC ranks fourth in the preseason Associated Press top 25 poll

USC was ranked No. 4 in the preseason Associated Press top 25 football poll released Monday, the first time the Trojans have entered the national title conversation in the College Football Playoff era.

Now comes the difficult part: winning enough to be in the top four of the CFP ranking — thereby qualifying for the playoff — at the end of the regular season.

Alabama took the top spot in the AP poll, receiving 52 of 61 first-place votes. Ohio State was ranked No. 2, Florida State No. 3 and Clemson, the defending champion, was ranked No. 5.

It has been a decade since USC’s dynasty faded into the era of Alabama’s dominion over college football. In that span, the Crimson Tide has begun the season ranked No. 1 four times.

The poll has no bearing on the CFP rankings, which come out weekly beginning Oct. 31. But it can shape initial opinion, framing which early wins are most impressive. And in the three years of the playoff, the poll has been a solid predictor of the final four teams.

At least one of the top four teams in the preseason poll has made it into the playoff each season. The preseason poll has predicted half — six of 12 — of all playoff teams. No team unranked in the preseason has sneaked into the playoff. Oklahoma was ranked 19th in 2015 and was the last team in the 2015 playoff.

USC did not practice on Monday and did not comment on the poll, but coach Clay Helton has indicated he would not be very interested in whatever it said.

“It’s not how you start, it’s how you finish,” Helton said over the weekend. “And to build your resume, it starts with Game One. It doesn’t matter where you’re ranked, to be honest with you, going into that game. It’s about how you effectively play. And more worried about performing a game plan and more worried about our assignments, fundamentals, techniques, than where we’re ranked or what people think about us.”

Three other Pac-12 teams cracked the rankings: Washington at No. 8, Stanford at No. 14, and Washington State at No. 24. UCLA didn’t make the top 25 but was among those receiving votes, tied for No. 36.

In the history of the poll, which was first released in 1936, USC is the sixth-most frequently ranked team in the nation. The Trojans have been listed in just more than two-thirds of all weeks.

USC hasn’t been ranked this high in the regular season since 2012, when the Trojans began the season at No. 1. They finished that season unranked. USC last began the season at No. 4 in 2009. It finished No. 22, at 9-4.

A year ago, USC dropped out of the poll after the first game. The Trojans languished among the unranked classes for nine weeks. By the end of the season, after the bowls, they were ranked No. 3.

“When we were really good and finished the season last year, we just worried about our opponent and nothing else,” Helton said. “And that’s the mentality that we’re taking into this season.”

Helton is one of the 65 coaches who vote in USA Today’s coaches poll this season, in which USC was ranked fourth.

He voted last year, when he said he would try to read up on teams during away games on the flight back to Los Angeles. His preferred method, he said, was inexact: Googling.

“I like reading up on other teams, and seeing where they are, seeing what they’re doing, seeing if there’s one or two things that we can pirate that can make us a better team,” he said.

The poll reveals the coaches’ rankings only once, after the regular season. That week last season, Helton voted USC eighth, one spot ahead of the consensus.

Earlier in training camp, he was asked where he’d voted USC this season. He laughed.

“I’ll leave that private,” he said.

zach.helfand@latimes.com

Follow Zach Helfand on Twitter @zhelfand

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