Without having the team or player ratings for EA Sports College Football 25, we’re left to make our own lists and rankings for the time being. One really helpful list has been created by OS user CM Hooe. He’s put the teams into groups based on “power level” so to speak.
I’ll let him explain in full below, but basically he wanted to nerd out and take a shot at trying out K-Means Clustering as a way to create an index of all 134 teams that will be in EA Sports College Football 25. I’m not going to pretend to know what K-Means Clustering is beyond assuming it’s a more agnostic way to group teams together into clusters (versus knowing the names of each college ahead of time and grouping them with that bias in play).
The other data used comes from the ESPN Football Power Index. By using this as a base, and then also putting a Football Power Index together for each conference, he clustered the teams into 12 different groups. Again, all of this is moot to some extent because we don’t know how EA is going to rank the teams and players as of yet, but it should give you a good idea about the buckets teams are going to generally fall into for dynasty mode.
Now, here’s CM Hooe with the full breakdown.
Ranking Every EA Sports College Football 25 Team For Dynasty Mode
Many of you are probably waiting on player and team OVR ratings before choosing your dynasty team of choice, but if you are impatient and don’t want to wait that long, I did some math to divide all the teams into groups which might help you out.
I started with the ESPN Football Power Index of each FBS team, then additionally computed each conference’s average FPI to plot each team on an 2D plane. Then I used K-Means Clustering to categorize each of the 134 teams into similar clusters.
The teams subdivided nicely into twelve different groups, which I will detail below:
College Football Playoff Contenders (15)
Teams in this cluster each play in a Power 4 conference with an automatic bid to the CFP and have a strong FPI rating relative to other teams in their conference. This cluster also includes independent Notre Dame.
- ACC: Florida State, Clemson, Louisville, Miami
- Big XII: Kansas, Kansas State, Arizona
- Big Ten: Oregon, Ohio State, Penn State, Michigan
- Independents: Notre Dame
- SEC: Georgia, Texas, Alabama
College Football Playoff Crashers (9)
Teams in this cluster each play in a Group of 6 conference. They are exceptionally strongly rated in FPI relative to their conference peers. They are likely strong enough to compete against and defeat many Power 4 teams.
- American: UTSA, Memphis, Tulane
- Conference USA: Liberty
- Mountain West: Boise State, Fresno State
- Sun Belt: James Madison, Appalachian State, Troy
Power 4 Dark Horse (16)
Teams in this cluster each play in a Power 4 conference. They aren’t quite at the top of the league, but they are strong enough where they can hang in out-of-conference games against fellow Power 4 teams and could reasonably compete for a conference championship if they get a few breaks. Oregon State also falls into this cluster.
- ACC: SMU, NC State
- Big XII: Oklahoma State, Utah, TCU, Texas Tech, UCF, Colorado, West Virginia
- Big Ten: USC
- Pac-12: Oregon State
- SEC: Oklahoma, Tennessee, Missouri, LSU, Texas A&M
Group of 6 Dark Horse (5)
Teams in this cluster each play in a Group of 6 conference. They either are the top teams in a weaker league, or a second-tier team in a stronger G6 conference. Teams in this tier are probably on the outside looking in for the College Football Playoff unless everything goes their way.
- Conference USA: Jacksonville State
- MAC: Miami (OH), Toledo, Bowling Green
- Mountain West: San Diego State
Group of 6 Conference Contenders (11)
Teams in this cluster each play in a Group of 6 conference. They represent teams in the middle of the pack in stronger G6 conferences. They could reasonably make a prestigious non-playoff bowl game with a great season including some key upsets over the teams ahead of them in the conference, but are not necessarily favored to do so.
- American: Florida Atlantic, South Florida, East Carolina, Rice
- Mountain West: San Jose State, UNLV, Air Force
- Sun Belt: Texas State, South Alabama, Marshall, Georgia State
Power 4 – Solid (11)
Teams in this cluster each play in a Power 4 conference. As rated by FPI, they are rated strong nationally and are in the upper half of their respective conferences, but would not be favored against any team belonging to the College Football Playoff Contender or Power 4 Dark Horse clusters.
- ACC: California, North Carolina
- Big XII: Iowa State
- Big Ten: Washington, Iowa, Wisconsin, UCLA, Nebraska
- SEC: Ole Miss, Auburn, Florida
Group of 6 – Solid (8)
Teams in this cluster each play in a Group of 6 conference. They won’t be favored against Power 4 teams and likely won’t be favored to win their conference either, but they aren’t so devoid of talent that they can’t offer a competitive experience at their level of play.
- Conference USA: Middle Tennessee, Western Kentucky, UTEP
- MAC: Northern Illinois, Ohio, Central Michigan, Buffalo, Western Michigan
Power 4 – Mid (13)
Teams in this cluster each play in a Power 4 conference. They are generally strongly rated in FPI nationally and still above most Group of 6 teams by FPI, but are well off the pace within their conference and the Power 4.
- ACC: Virginia Tech, Duke, Pittsburgh, Georgia Tech, Boston College
- Big XII: Baylor
- Big Ten: Maryland, Rutgers, Northwestern
- SEC: Kentucky, South Carolina, Arkansas, Mississippi State
Group of 6 – Mid (10)
Teams in this cluster each play in a Group of 6 conference. They are generally the weaker teams in the better G6 conferences, but there’s likely a path to bowl eligibility if you are a good coach.
- American: UAB, Tulsa, North Texas
- Conference USA: Louisiana Tech
- Mountain West: Wyoming, Utah State
- Sun Belt: Coastal Carolina, Louisiana, Arkansas State, Georgia Southern
Power 4 – Basement (15)
Teams in this cluster each play in a Power 4 conference. They have above-average FPI ratings nationally but are the weakest teams in their respective conferences. They may be underdogs in games against teams at the top of the Group of 6. Six wins is a good season for any team in this cluster. Washington State also falls into this cluster.
- ACC: Stanford, Syracuse, Wake Forest, Virginia
- Big XII: Arizona State, Cincinnati, BYU, Houston
- Big Ten: Purdue, Minnesota, Illinois, Michigan State, Indiana
- Pac-12: Washington State
- SEC: Vanderbilt
Group of 6 – Basement (13)
Teams in this cluster are either members of a Group of 6 conference or an independent. They are not rated well by FPI and are projected to finish towards the bottom of their respective conferences where applicable.
- American: Charlotte, Army
- Conference USA: New Mexico State, Sam Houston
- Independents: UConn, Massachusetts
- MAC: Ball State, Eastern Michigan, Akron
- Mountain West: Colorado State, Hawaii
- Sun Belt: Southern Miss, Old Dominion
Group of 6 – Rebuild (8)
Teams in this cluster each play for a Group of 6 conference. They are the worst teams in their league. Their 2024 outlook is generally dire. There’s room for upward mobility if you are patient, but it’s going to take time.
- American: Navy, Temple
- Conference USA: Kennesaw State, FIU
- MAC: Kent State
- Mountain West: New Mexico, Nevada
- Sun Belt: UL Monroe
Comments: This exercise was mostly done as an exercise to teach myself how to do K-Means Clustering. I have no idea how accurate these clusters will be relative to the launch-day team ratings in EASCFB25, but for now it may prove useful to you as a broad guide.
ESPN FPI strongly favors Power 4 teams across the board; only teams in the CFP Crasher cluster have stronger FPI ratings than any Power 4 team, and even then, none of the CFP Crasher teams have FPI ratings stronger than the lowest-rated team in the Power 4 – Solid cluster. Further, every team in the Power 4 – Basement cluster has a higher FPI than all G6 teams not in the CFP Crasher cluster. Given that the sport of college football is rather strongly defined by upsets — especially the further one moves away from the top of the sport — I don’t believe this disparity between the bottom of the Power 4 and the second tier of the Group of 6 to be truly accurate.
