Arizona is in "Tier 14: Room for improvement (six teams)" as ESPN posted a "Ranking all 136 FBS teams in tiers" on Thursday morning. Arizona State is the highest-tiered team Arizona will play in 2025 and in the Big XII in "Tier 4: Last year's playoff surprises (four teams)."
ASU went from 3-9 in 2023 to 11-3, a Big XII title in its first season and a berth in the College Football Playoff quarterfinals. Arizona did the reverse in 2024. The Wildcats were 10-3 in 2023 and 4-8 in 2024. Neither team had a recent history of success before their breakout seasons.
Tier 6: The Big 12 is the new ACC Coastal (four teams) has Baylor, Iowa State, Kansas State
TCU. TCU is the only one of those four that Arizona does not play in 2025. Kansas State will be the first test for Arizona during the 2025 season on September 12.
The game against Kansas State is a non-conference game that was scheduled before Arizona joined the Big XII. Arizona begins Big XII play versus Iowa State on September 27 and hosts Baylor on November 22. David Hale of ESPN said of the Big XII, "Throw the names into a hat and pull one out. You're as likely to get it right as we are."
I ranked all 136 teams into tiers. I immediately regret many choices but I won't know my biggest missteps until you read it and yell at me. https://t.co/gPV1upZIsg pic.twitter.com/Y9OfUK9ITo
— 💫🅰️♈️🆔 (@ADavidHaleJoint) August 7, 2025
"The Wildcats struggled in Year 1 under Brent Brennan, but they bring back Noah Fifita at QB and showed enough life that a step forward in 2025 isn't unrealistic."David Hale, ESPN
Kansas is in "Tier 7: Flying beneath the radar like Tom Cruise in 'Maverick' (five teams)." Hale mentioned, "Kansas was 1-5 in games decided by a touchdown or less last year but also had wins over three straight ranked teams in November...the return ofJalon Daniels, the Jayhawks look like a potential sleeper."
BYU is in Hale's "Tier 8: Regression to the mean (the bad kind) (five teams)." BYU is the opposite of Kansas. The Cougars won six out of seven games when they entered the fourth quarter tied in 2024. After losing big at BYU in 2024, Arizona gets the Cougars in Tucson in 2025.
Colorado, Cincinnati and Houston are in "Tier 11: Potential sleepers (seven teams)." The question for Colorado is how will they replace Heisman Trophy winner Travis Hunter and quarterback Shadeur Sanders. Cincinnati finished 2024 with five straight losses and Houston was the only win for Arizona in its last seven contests.
Oklahoma State is in tier 14 with Arizona after losing all nine of its Big XII games in 2024. Hawaii is the only FBS non-conference game for Arizona versus a non-Big XII team. Hale placed Hawaii in Tier 18: We could be talked into them (eight teams)."
Hale stated, "Hawai'i won five games and missed out on beating UCLA and UNLV by a combined five points. The Rainbow Warriors are trending in the right direction." Hawaii projects to be a better team than Mountain West rival New Mexico, who Arizona beat 61-39 in the 2024 season opener.