The AP Poll was started in 1936 and has continued to run to this day. The poll takes the collective opinion of different sportswriters and broadcasters and aggregates their views into a single poll. The subjective nature of the poll has lead many to critique the poll and propose other solutions, but today the poll persists and still has a significant impact on the way certain teams are viewed in the college football.

The goal of this project is simple. We want to find the team that has not been in the AP Poll the longest. However, this is complicated for several reasons. As we go back in time, some teams lose the ability to make the poll as they are members of the FCS. Thus, their drought would technically end when they are introduced to the FBS. Now that this is clear, let us discover which team has suffered mediocrity the longest. We will also be including the AP Preseason Poll. Let's also be clear that a team must be ranked, unranked teams "in consideration" are considered not part of the poll even though they show up on it.

Yeah, I actually just did that.

The Rundown

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2017 Season

So, we must go backward through each poll starting from Week 5 for the 2017 season. The nice thing is that we can eliminate 25 teams straight away, leaving 105 teams in consideration. Most of the teams are Power 5 schools, so we will see how long a Power 5 team can stick around. By the time we get to the preseason, we can eliminate 32 teams from the poll. We can also remove the Coastal Carolina Chanticleers who joined the FCS this year. This narrows us down to 97 teams who can continue to extend their droughts.

2016 Season

Going into the 2016 season, we see that many of the teams that currently occupy the Top 25 tend to stay there over the years. This keeps other teams from regularly moving in and out of the poll. There were 18 unique teams in the poll this year, leaving 79 teams left who could extend their droughts. Only 25 Power 5 schools remain unranked in the past two years.

2015 Season

The number of novel AP ranked teams continues to decline. We only see 8 new teams, with 6 of them coming from Power 5 conferences. This leaves us with 71 teams who could continue to extend their droughts. That is still more then half of the available teams. This also marks Charlotte's first year as a FBS team, so the number drops to 70.

2014 Season

We only see 6 new teams during this year, only three of them being Power 5 teams. This was also the first FBS season for three teams, Appalachian State, Georgia Southern, and Old Dominion. So, we can remove them from the list. Thus, the number drops to 61.

2013 Season

We see seven more teams on the AP Poll this year. With Oregon State being ranked this season, that means that all teams in the current PAC-12 have been eliminated from contention. Also, we can remove Georgia State, since this is their first season in the FBS. This reduces our count to 53 teams. with only 12 Power 5 teams remaining.

2012 Season

We add 7 more teams to the members of the ranked. Only Rutgers, is currently a member of a Power 5 Conference. We also can remove an additional four teams (Massachusetts, Texas State, South Alabama, and UTSA) because prior to this year, they were members of the FCS. We are now down to 42 teams remaining with 11 in the Power 5.

2011 Season

Things are starting to get kind of sparse. We only see three novel teams in the AP Poll, Illinois, Virginia, and Southern Miss. The total number of teams eligible for our drought is down to 39.

2010 Season

We see 6 more teams added to the members of the ranked. Only NC State is a current member of the Power 5. Subtracting them from our total, we are down to 33 members currently in the drought. 8 of them are currently in the Power 5.

2005-2009 Seasons

In order to speed things up, we will start to chunk up our timeline. Central Michigan and Kansas were the only teams that showed up during the 2009 season. Three new teams showed up in 2008, being Ball State, Boston College, and Wake Forest. In 2007, Kentucky and Purdue were on the poll. We see no new additions in 2006, and UTEP and Iowa State were included in the poll in 2005. This leaves only 24 teams left to track, with only Indiana and Syracuse being current Power 5 teams.

2000-2004 Seasons

Bowling Green was in the AP Poll for a week in 2004. 2004 was also the first season in the FBS for both Florida Atlantic and Florida International. Miami of Ohio was in the AP Poll in 2003. There were zero teams of interest in 2002. Syracuse was in the 2001 AP Poll. There were no teams in 2000 as well. This leaves us with 19 teams remaining, with Indiana being the only Power 5 school left with a shot at "winning" the longest drought.

The 1990-1999 Seasons

The Middle Tennessee State Blue Raiders and Buffalo Bulls made their moves to the FBS in 1999, thus we remove them. Tulane was ranked and went undefeated in 1998. Wyoming was also ranked in 1998. Army was last ranked in 1996. UAB and Idaho also had their transition in 1996, removing them from the group. North Texas made the leap in 1995, removing them from consideration. Indiana, our last Power 5 team was last ranked in 1994. It has been 23 years since Indiana was ranked. Northwest Louisiana (LA-Monroe) also made their move to the top division in 1994. In 1990, Arkansas State moved up from Division-1AA. This leaves 8 teams that are still in the top division and have not been featured in a AP Poll since before 1990.

The Rest of Time

Akron had its first season in the top division in 1987. SMU was last ranked in 1986. UNLV moved to Division 1 in 1978. Eastern Michigan would join Division 1 in 1975. Southwestern Louisiana (Louisiana-Lafayette) joined Division 1 in 1974. This leaves us with 3 teams: Rice, New Mexico, and New Mexico State.

Rice was last ranked in 1961. New Mexico State was last ranked in 1960. Thus, New Mexico is our winner! When was the last time they were ranked? Never. They started playing in Division 1 in 1931. Five years before the start of the poll. That's right. New Mexico is the only team who has managed to stay in the top level of football without ever receiving a ranking. Crazy. Their drought is 81 years and going strong.

Thanks for taking the time to read! It's been crazy to spend hours researching to find the answer to this question. If you thought my time was worth it, simply give me an upvote. If you think I'm crazy, feel free to leave a comment tell me so. I meant to finish writing this on Saturday, but it is Sunday now. Insane.

Sources:

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Sports Reference
Wikipedia
AP Poll