Sixty-one AP voters put Texas first this week. Run the same 25 teams through RallyFuel’s Football NIL Index and the Longhorns land tenth, level with Tennessee at 22.7.
The top of this board is a tie. Ohio State and Indiana both score 25.9, and they got there by opposite routes. Miami is third. SMU, 24th in the poll, is eighth.
This is the Week 6 edition of the board we first ran in August. Same question as then: the poll measures who voters think is best, and the Index measures which programs carry NIL momentum. Both numbers are correct. They are answering different questions.
The board
| # | Team | Conf | NIL Index | AP | Move |
| T1 | Ohio State | Big Ten | 25.9 | 5 | ▲ 4 |
| T1 | Indiana | Big Ten | 25.9 | 7 | ▲ 6 |
| 3 | Miami | ACC | 25.2 | 4 | ▲ 1 |
| 4 | Texas Tech | Big 12 | 24.9 | 11 | ▲ 7 |
| 5 | LSU | SEC | 24.8 | 10 | ▲ 5 |
| 6 | Oregon | Big Ten | 24.3 | 13 | ▲ 7 |
| 7 | Georgia | SEC | 23.6 | 2 | ▼ 5 |
| 8 | SMU | ACC | 23.2 | 24 | ▲ 16 |
| 9 | Florida | SEC | 23.0 | 16 | ▲ 7 |
| T10 | Texas | SEC | 22.7 | 1 | ▼ 9 |
| T10 | Tennessee | SEC | 22.7 | 15 | ▲ 5 |
| T12 | Ole Miss | SEC | 22.6 | 9 | ▼ 3 |
| T12 | UCLA | Big Ten | 22.6 | 21 | ▲ 9 |
| 14 | USC | Big Ten | 22.4 | 19 | ▲ 5 |
| 15 | Oklahoma State | Big 12 | 22.0 | 18 | ▲ 3 |
| 16 | Pittsburgh | ACC | 21.4 | 25 | ▲ 9 |
| 17 | Notre Dame | Ind. | 21.3 | 3 | ▼ 14 |
| T18 | Alabama | SEC | 20.8 | 6 | ▼ 12 |
| T18 | Mississippi State | SEC | 20.8 | 17 | ▼ 1 |
| 20 | Houston | Big 12 | 20.6 | 22 | ▲ 2 |
| 21 | Iowa | Big Ten | 20.4 | 20 | ▼ 1 |
| 22 | BYU | Big 12 | 19.4 | 8 | ▼ 14 |
| 23 | Boise State | Pac-12 | 19.1 | 23 | — |
| 24 | Missouri | SEC | 18.9 | 14 | ▼ 10 |
| 25 | Utah | Big 12 | 17.3 | 12 | ▼ 13 |
Every score is out of 100. Four pairs are level to the tenth: Ohio State and Indiana, Texas and Tennessee, Ole Miss and UCLA, Alabama and Mississippi State. Those are ties, not orderings, and tied teams are listed by AP rank.
The SEC places nine teams on this board and only one in the top six. The Big Ten has three of the top six.
Three ways to the top
The three programs at the top of this board are separated by 0.7 points, and no two of them got there the same way.
Indiana wins on football. A performance score of 22.7 is third in the field, behind only Oklahoma State and SMU. Indiana’s Fan Demand of 4.5 is also third. Its social power of 45.7 sits barely above the field median of 44.7. The Hoosiers are scored on 39 indexed athletes, the second-fewest on the board.
Ohio State wins on the platform. The Buckeyes lead the field in Fan Demand at 6.4 and in social power at 52.5. Performance is 15.6, just below the median of 16.1. In August Ohio State led Fan Demand by a factor of five. It still leads it, now by 1.8 points over Missouri, and it is still the column built from RallyFuel’s own data.
Miami wins on the market. NIL Visibility of 44.5 is the best on the board, a tenth ahead of Oregon. Social power 49.8 and performance 16.9 are both above the median. Miami is fourth in the poll and third here, the closest any top-five team comes to agreeing with the voters.
What the poll misses
SMU, up sixteen. Twenty-fourth by the voters, eighth here. A performance score of 23.5 is second in the field, behind only Oklahoma State. Visibility 31.6 and social power 42.6 are both below the median, so football is doing the work. SMU is scored on 36 athletes, the fewest on the board, which makes its production unusually concentrated.
Texas Tech, up seven. Unbeaten and fourth here. Performance 20.4 ranks fourth, visibility 39.7 sixth, social power 47.7 above the median. It is one of five programs above the field median in all three imported columns, with Indiana, Miami, LSU and UCLA.
Oregon, up seven. The opposite case to SMU. Visibility 44.4 and social power 51.0 are both top three in the field. Performance 14.3 is in the bottom six. Oregon reads like a national brand and is playing like the No. 13 team the voters have it.
Texas, down nine. The AP’s No. 1 scores 14.7 on performance, below the field median, and 1.2 on Fan Demand. Visibility 37.1 and social power 49.4 are solid without leading anything. A 4-0 start has not yet shown up in the documented production this component reads.
Notre Dame, down fourteen. Performance 19.5 is sixth in the field and Fan Demand 3.2 is fourth. But visibility 28.8 and social power 39.8 are each the fourth-lowest on the board. Notre Dame plays like a top-five team and, by these two columns, reaches like a mid-board one.
BYU, down fourteen. Eighth in the poll, 22nd here. Performance 12.6 is the third-lowest in the field and Fan Demand 0.2 is tied for the lowest. BYU has 97 athletes indexed, so this is not a thin sample.
Utah, down thirteen. Last on the board. Visibility 24.9 and social power 35.6 are both the lowest in the field.
Alabama, down twelve. Performance 16.5 is just above the median. Fan Demand 0.3 and social power 40.7, fifth-lowest, are what pull the Tide to 18th.
Missouri, down ten. The strangest line on the board. Missouri’s Fan Demand of 4.6 is second only to Ohio State, ahead of Indiana and Notre Dame. Visibility 26.9 and social power 36.7 are both near the bottom of the field. A fanbase that shows up on RallyFuel, attached to a program the wider market has not priced.
Oklahoma State, the best football on the board. Performance 25.3 leads the field. Visibility 26.8 and social power 36.8 are each second- or third-lowest, which is why the Cowboys are 15th here and 18th in the poll.
The column that still hasn’t spoken
In August we wrote that Fan Demand was barely awake and would start moving once the season did. Six weeks in, it is still quiet. The median across this week’s field is 0.9 out of 100, and no program clears 6.5.
Only four teams sit meaningfully above the floor: Ohio State at 6.4, Missouri at 4.6, Indiana at 4.5 and Notre Dame at 3.2. Everyone else is under 2.
That makes it the cheapest column on the board to move. Fan Demand is 25% of the score, so a 10-point rise is worth 2.5 Index points. For Texas that would mean 25.2, level with Miami in third. The other three columns are records of what has already happened. This one is the fans, and it can change before Saturday.
Find your team’s athletes and fuel them →
Where they meet this week
No. 2 Georgia at No. 6 Alabama · Saturday, 7:30 PM ET · ABC
Four places apart in the poll, eleven apart here: Georgia seventh at 23.6, Alabama 18th at 20.8. The gap is reach. Georgia leads social power 50.1 to 40.7 and visibility 39.9 to 33.8. Alabama has the better performance score, 16.5 to 14.6, and after opening as a rare home underdog the Tide are now favored. Compare the two programs →
No. 21 UCLA at No. 13 Oregon · Saturday, 3:30 PM ET · CBS
The board agrees with the voters on the order and narrows the gap: Oregon sixth at 24.3, UCLA tied for 12th at 22.6. UCLA has the better football number, 16.5 to 14.3. Oregon has the bigger platform, 44.4 to 37.8 on visibility.
Also on the board this week
| Game | When | The split |
| Oklahoma vs. No. 1 Texas, Dallas | Sat 3:30, ABC | AP No. 1, tenth here |
| No. 7 Indiana at Nebraska | Sat 12:00, FOX | Tied for first here, at an unbeaten Nebraska |
| Texas A&M at No. 14 Missouri | Sat 12:00, ABC | Second in Fan Demand, 24th overall |
| Stanford at No. 3 Notre Dame | Sat 3:30, NBC | Down fourteen places on reach |
| Kansas at No. 12 Utah | Sat 10:15, ESPN | Last on the board |
| No. 19 USC at Penn State | Sat 7:30, NBC | 14th here, up five |
Every game is open for picks on the Football Predictions board. Twenty points a pick, free to play, closing at kickoff.
How the Index is built
| Component | Weight | What it measures | Source |
| Performance | 35% | Stats, efficiency, team success | Box scores and results |
| Fan Demand | 25% | Searches, profile views, fuel activity | RallyFuel only |
| NIL Visibility | 20% | Estimated deal value, brand partnerships, media exposure | The wider sport |
| Social Power | 20% | Follower counts, engagement rates, growth | Social platforms |
Weight those four and you get a Team NIL Score, a 0 to 100 rating of a program’s NIL momentum. Three components are imported from the wider sport. One is generated here, and it is the only one that can move before a game is played.
Notes on the data
Figures are the live Team NIL Score on each program’s RallyFuel football page, captured October 5, 2026. AP ranks are from the Week 6 poll. The Index refreshes weekly.
Performance is built from the athletes currently indexed for each program, from 36 at SMU to 111 at Tennessee. It reflects documented production and can move between refreshes as roster records update.
Scores have tightened since the August board, whose leader was Indiana at 30.5. This week the top 25 run from 25.9 to 17.3. Week-to-week movement is best read within a single board rather than against August’s figures.
The NIL Index measures NIL momentum rather than on-field strength, which is why a team can be first in the poll and tenth here. Both numbers are correct. They are answering different questions.
Fueling an athlete on RallyFuel is a purchase of conditional NIL engagement rights, which convert into an NIL deal only when the stated conditions are met. It is not a donation, and it is not a payment for athletic performance. Terms and refund conditions are posted at checkout. 90% reaches the athlete.
Dig into the numbers
- Compare two programs — the School Rivalry tool stacks any two side by side, like Ohio State against Indiana
- Make your picks — football predictions week by week, +20 points per pick
- See the national board — schools leaderboard
- Browse a conference — Big Ten · SEC · ACC · Big 12
- Watch the movement — the Transfer Tracker follows who is entering and committing
- Learn the terms — the NIL Glossary covers the vocabulary behind the numbers
