The votes are in, and once again Oklahoma is the team to beat in college football. However, the SEC is again the power conference.

The Sooners debuted Saturday at No. 1 in the Associated Press Top 25 preseason poll for the 10th time, more than any other team in history. Oklahoma also was No. 1 in the USA Today coaches poll.

However, the Sooners will have to hold off a herd of SEC teams, led by the No. 2 Crimson Tide of Alabama, one of a record eight SEC teams included. Georgia debuted at No. 19. The Bulldogs are No. 22 in the coaches poll.

“We want to come out and win a national championship, to be undefeated,” Alabama safety Mark Barron told the Associated Press. “Every time we step out on the field, one of our motivating factors is to be special.”

Oregon, LSU and Boise State round out the AP’s top five.

Does No. 1 matter?

The Sooners have won the AP title four times when they were preseason No. 1: 1956, 1974, 1975 and 1985. They were most recently the preseason No. 1 in 2003. That season they lost to LSU in the BCS championship game.

SEC dominates

The SEC, home of the past five national champions, including Auburn last season, machine-gunned the polls with three from the East and five from the West.

Eight SEC teams also made the coaches poll.

Auburn, which lost College Park native Cam Newton, the first pick in the NFL draft, are No. 23 in the AP poll and No. 19 in the coaches poll. That’s the largest disparity between the media and coaches polls among SEC schools.

How ’bout the ACC?

The ACC had a meager two teams in the AP poll, the same number as in the coaches poll.

Joining No. 6 Florida State is No. 13 Virginia Tech. It’s the best start for the Seminoles since debuting at No. 5 in 2004. The two teams were predicted by the ACC media to play for the conference championship later this season.

The Seminoles are No. 5 in the coaches poll, and the Hokies are No. 13.

Georgia Tech received no votes for the first time since 2008, Paul Johnson’s first as coach.

Other conferences

The Big Ten has four teams in the AP poll: No. 10 Nebraska (the conference’s newbie), No. 11 Wisconsin, No. 17 Michigan State and No. 18 Ohio State. Those four and Penn State, at No. 25, were ranked by the coaches.

The Big 12 has four in the AP poll: No. 1 Oklahoma, No. 8 Texas A&M, No. 9 Oklahoma State and No. 21 Missouri. With the inclusion of Texas, which wasn’t ranked in the AP preseason poll for the first time since 1998, the Big 12 has five in the coaches poll.

The Pac-12 has three in the AP: Oregon, No. 7 Stanford and No. 25 USC, and the Mountain West two: Boise State and No. 14 TCU, which will join the Big East next year.

The Big East has one ranked school: No. 24 West Virginia. No Big East team was ranked in the coaches poll.

Major shake-ups

It likely won’t take long for the polls to get scrambled. The No. 19 Bulldogs will play the No. 5 Broncos in the Chick-fil-A Kickoff game Sept. 3 at the Georgia Dome and then host No. 12 South Carolina the next week. With two wins, the Bulldogs could climb the charts.

“It’s nice to be ranked right now, and we knew Boise would be highly ranked, and this is an opportunity to play a top five team to open the season,” Georgia coach Mark Richt said.

In other critical games, No. 3 LSU will take on No. 3 Oregon, last year’s loser in the BCS championship game, in Arlington, Texas, in another marquee Week 1 game.

The Sooners will get their first major test, and one they desperately need to pass considering they are 1-5 in their past six BCS bowl games, when they go to the No. 6 Seminoles on Sept. 17.

Material from the Associated Press was used in this article.