Finish No. 1. Start No. 1. Even Bobby Bowden's best Florida State teams never did that.
But the Seminoles of Coach Jimbo Fisher and 2013 Heisman Trophy winner Jameis Winston will.
Florida State, the defending national champion, comes in as the preseason No. 1 in The Associated Press Top 25 for the sixth time.
This is the first time the Seminoles have never started a season No. 1 after finishing No. 1.
The 2000 Seminoles were preseason No. 2 after winning in 1999, and after Bowden, the Hall of Fame coach whom Fisher replaced, won his first national championship in 1993, Florida State started 1994 ranked No. 3.
Fisher's Seminoles have a long way to go to compare to Florida State's unprecedented run of national championship contention, a string of 14 consecutive seasons during which the 'Noles finished the season ranked in the top five of the AP rankings.
Still, make no mistake: Florida State 2.0 is built to last.
"We're the second-winningest team in the country the last four years, the winningest team the last two years and have had the most NFL players," Fisher said. "We've recruited well, too. Recruited a lot of great young players we've been able to mentor and develop as we go, so we're very comfortable with the guys who are replacing the guys that left."
The Seminoles received 57 of 60 first-place votes from the media panel. No. 2 Alabama, No. 3 Oregon and No. 4 Oklahoma got one first-place vote each.
Ohio State is No. 5 and Auburn, which lost the final BCS national championship game to the Seminoles 34-31, is No. 6.
Alabama and Auburn are no strangers to going into seasons ranked in the Top 10 -- Alabama 32 times and Auburn 15 times -- but this marks the fourth time they are both in the top 10 the season year.
The Crimson Tide and Tigers were two of eight SEC teams in the Top 25. The others: South Carolina (No. 9), Georgia (No. 12), LSU (No. 13), Mississippi (No. 18), Texas A&M (No. 21) and Missouri (No. 24).
Arkansas, which received no votes in the AP poll, was one of two SEC West teams, along with Mississippi State, not in the preseason Top 25. But the Bulldogs received 22 votes among the other receiving votes.
It's Auburn's highest preseason ranking since coming in No. 4 in 2006.
"Last year nobody picked us to do anything," Auburn Coach Gus Malzahn said, "so we don't get wrapped up in that."
The only other times Alabama and Auburn both appeared in the preseason top 10 occurred in 1964 and 1975 under the guidance of the most revered coaches in the respective programs' history -- Alabama's Paul "Bear" Bryant and Ralph "Shug" Jordan, both Hall of Famers.
The high rankings aren't a surprise. If the four-team playoff had been in place last season, the two might have met in a semifinal rematch of one of last season's most thrilling games.
Auburn won 34-28 when Chris Davis returned a missed field goal 109 yards for a touchdown on the final play.
Led by quarterback Nick Marshall, Auburn opened last season unranked and played for a national title. The 2010 national champs started out ranked 22nd while the 1957 team that won Auburn's other national title wasn't ranked.
Recent history indicates the No. 2 ranking is a good spot for Alabama. That's where the Tide's 2011 and 2012 national title teams opened. The 2009 team that brought Nick Saban's first title to Tuscaloosa began at No. 5.
Last season was a good reminder that preseason rankings can look pretty silly by the end of the season. Four teams that finished in final top 10 last season (No. 2 Auburn, No. 3 Michigan State, No. 5 Missouri and No. 10 UCF) were unranked to start the season. Throw in No. 13 Baylor, No. 20 Arizona State and No. 23 Duke, and seven of the teams that either won or played for the championship in the six conferences with BCS automatic-qualifying status began 2013 unranked.
The Bowl Championship Series is gone now, replaced by the College Football Playoff. The top four teams will be placed into national semifinals to be played on New Year's Day and advance to the championship game about a week and half later.
Expect surprises, though coming up with a scenario in which Florida State is not part of college football's first final four is difficult.
Winston will make a run at his second Heisman behind an offensive line that returns four starters. There's turnover at receiver and running back but still plenty left of four- and five-star talent left behind.
Same goes on defense, where sophomore safety Jalen Ramsey and defensive end Mario Edwards step into leadership roles.
Florida State is the hunted again. Fisher wants them to still act like hunters.
"We better have that attitude. It's got to be your attitude every year," said Fisher, starting his fifth season as Florida State coach. "We call it an attitude of domination. You can never be satisfied."
Sports on 08/18/2014