Two human polls comprised the 1958 major college football rankings. Unlike most sports, college football's governing body, the NCAA, does not bestow a national championship, instead that title is bestowed by one or more different polling agencies. There are two main weekly polls that begin in the preseasonâÂÂthe AP Poll and the Coaches Poll.
The final AP poll was released on December 1, at the end of the 1958 regular season, weeks before the major bowls. The AP would not release a post-bowl season final poll regularly until 1968.
The final UPI Coaches Poll was released prior to the bowl games, on <br> LSU received 29 of the 35 first-place votes; Iowa received four, and one each went to Army and Air Force.
The final Litkenhous Ratings, released in December 1958, ranked over 650 teams. The top 50 teams as ranked by Litkenhous were:
1. LSU<br> 2. Army<br> 3. Oklahoma<br> 4. Iowa<br> 5. Wisconsin<br> 6. Ole Miss<br> 7. Syracuse<br> 8. Purdue<br> 9. TCU<br> 10. Ohio State<br> 11. Northwestern<br> 12. SMU<br> 13. Auburn<br> 14. Notre Dame<br> 15. Rice<br> 16. Georgia<br> 17. Florida<br> 18. Penn State<br> 19. Illinois<br> 20. Air Force<br> 21. Pittsburgh<br> 22. Texas<br> 23. North Carolina<br> 24. Vanderbilt<br> 25. Alabama<br> 26. Washington State<br> 27. Kentucky<br> 28. Georgia Tech<br> 29. Mississippi Southern<br> 30. Arkansas<br> 31. Oregon<br> 32. Michigan State<br> 33. Oklahoma State<br> 34. Mississippi State<br> 35. Houston<br> 36. South Carolina<br> 37. Trinity (TX)<br> 38. USC<br> 39. Minnesota<br> 40. West Virginia<br> 41. Florida State<br> 42. Duke<br> 43. Navy<br> 44. Tulsa<br> 45. Colorado<br> 46. Tennessee<br> 47. Texas East<br> 48. Missouri<br> 49. Indiana<br> 50. California<br> 73. Memphis State - 76.5<br> 81. Chattanooga - 74.6<br>