Florida football's start to the Jon Sumrall era improved to 3-0 on Saturday night with a 44-39 victory over the Auburn Tigers at Jordan-Hare Stadium, while earning its first SEC win of the 2026 campaign. The Gators have also scored 40 points or more over the opening three games for the first time since Urban Meyer's team accomplished the feat in 2007.
Following college football's Week 3 action, ESPN's Bill Connelly released his third SP+ update of the regular season, with the Orange and Blue landing at 15th overall with a 17.8 SP+ rating. That represents a two-spot drop from last week's ranking and a 1.6-point decrease from the previous rating.
Looking deeper into the numbers, Florida's offensive SP+ of 33.4 ranks 20th in the nation, marking a 0.8-point
and one-spot improvement from the last update. Meanwhile, the defense checks in at 15th with a 16.9 rating — a five-spot drop but a 2.4-point increase — and the special teams improved four spots to ninth while remaining at a 0.5 rating.
The Gators are accompanied by nine other SEC schools in the SP+ rankings' top 25, headlined by second-ranked Georgia, followed by Texas (No. 6), LSU (No. 9) and Tennessee (No. 10) among the top 10. The remaining top-25 representatives are Alabama (No. 11), Texas A&M (No. 14), Florida (No. 15), Oklahoma (No. 16), Ole Miss (No. 20) and Missouri (No. 22).
South Carolina, which was ranked No. 17 last week, dropped out of the top 25 to No. 26 this week.
ESPN's Week 3 SP+ top 25 rankings
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This article originally appeared on Gators Wire: Florida falls in SP+ rankings despite road win over Auburn in Week 3
