Lindy’s 2026 preseason preview places Ohio State among the sport’s best, setting the tone for a new season

Ohio State enters the 2026 season with one of its familiar positioning advantages: national visibility. On June 19, Yahoo Sports highlighted that Lindy’s Sports College Football Preview for 2026 has the Buckeyes ranked among the best teams in college football heading into the year, a placement that reflects how the program is being viewed before spring work and fall games become the true sorting mechanism.

Lindy’s is one of the long-running preseason outlets that treats football like a weekly reading habit. The magazine, which has editions on newsstands each cycle, is designed to give fans a first pass at the sport’s title picture through preseason rankings and commentary. In that framework, Ohio State’s inclusion near the top tier matters because it indicates respect for the program’s expected baseline of talent, coaching continuity, and recruiting gravity.

The Yahoo Sports report does not specify Ohio State’s exact placement in the Lindy’s preseason list, but it is clear about the overall takeaway: the Buckeyes are being grouped with the teams Lindy’s considers elite in 2026. For Ohio State, that kind of early ranking is less about a single number and more about how quickly the national conversation is being set, with the Buckeyes framed as a baseline contender rather than a surprise storyline.

Preseason rankings also serve as a scoreboard for expectations across college football. Programs at Ohio State’s level are rarely allowed the luxury of slow starts in public perception. The preseason positioning can influence how media and opponents approach matchups, how fans interpret early-season performance, and how the team is discussed when awards and postseason paths begin to narrow.

At the same time, preseason magazines are not working documents. College football rosters change in ways that a printed preview cannot fully anticipate, and the real evaluation comes from the late-summer depth chart battles, the nonconference results that clarify team identity, and the way contenders respond when the season turns into conference play. Ohio State’s actual season trajectory will be decided on the field, regardless of where Lindy’s places the program in its preseason pecking order.

What to watch next is whether Ohio State’s on-field form matches the magazine’s early confidence once games begin, and whether the Buckeyes can turn preseason status into postseason execution. If the team validates its positioning, the 2026 narrative will likely stay crowded around the Buckeyes as a serious championship contender. If not, Lindy’s ranking will become one of those preseason markers fans revisit when the season’s reality departs from the hype.

For now, the main confirmed point from the reporting is simple: in Lindy’s 2026 preseason rankings, Ohio State is ranked among the best in the game. That is the kind of early-season framing the program tends to see often, and it will be interesting to see how long the Buckeyes can keep meeting the expectations that come with it.