Pre-Season rankings are mostly meaningless. It’s nice to be listed, and it tells you a lot about the expectations of the team; but it is really just a guess. Besides there are so many pre-season rankings, it’s hard to get a feel for where the team is really expected to be. Pitt’s athletic site collected 12 different preseason rankings (PDF). The rankings vary from #5 to #19. Like figure skating, throw out the top rank and the bottom, and what you are left with are 10 rankings between #8 and #12. Roughly speaking, Pitt is expected to be the #10 team. That is BCS fringe — can either fall in or out.
