TheHarris Interactive College Football Poll was a weekly ranking of the top 25NCAADivision I Football Bowl Subdivisioncollege football teams. The rankings were compiled byHarris Interactive, amarket research company that specializes inInternet research.
The poll was created in the summer of 2005 to replace theAP Poll in theBCS formula. The AP had decided it no longer wanted to be a part of the formula used by theBCS rankings to determine who plays in theBCS National Championship Game.[1] Unlike the other two seasonal polls, the AP Poll and theCoaches Poll, the Harris Poll did not release a preseason poll; in fact, it did not come out until the last half of October, several weeks into the season. Also, the Harris Poll did not release a post-bowl game poll or crown anational champion; the final Harris Poll was released along with the final BCS rankings.
The Harris Interactive Poll was composed of former players, coaches, administrators, and current and former media who submitted votes for the top 25 teams each week. The panel was designed to be a statistically valid representation of all 11FBS Conferences andindependent institutions.[2]
First, Division I-Bowl Subdivision college football conferences and independent institutions nominated prospective panelists. Then Harris randomly selected 115[3] members from the nominees to participate in the actual panel. Each week from mid October to the end of the regular college football season these 115 panelists voted on the particular ranking of teams. These rankings were then published and are used to determine 1/3 of the BCS standings.
The Harris poll's final rankings were from the last week of the regular season for the purpose of producing a final BCS ranking. The Harris poll did not crown a champion in a post-bowl poll.
See results at:Final 2005 Harris PollArchived 2012-09-16 at theWayback Machine
See results at:Final 2006 Harris PollArchived 2011-11-25 at theWayback Machine
See results at:Final 2007 Harris PollArchived 2011-11-11 at theWayback Machine
See results at:Final 2008 Harris PollArchived 2011-11-11 at theWayback Machine
See results at:Final 2009 Harris PollArchived 2011-11-12 at theWayback Machine
See results at:Final 2010 Harris Poll
See results at:Final 2011 Harris PollArchived 2012-01-05 at theWayback Machine
See results at:Final 2012 Harris PollArchived 2013-02-24 at theWayback Machine
See results at:Final 2013 Harris PollArchived 2013-12-30 at theWayback Machine