TCU Ranked 6th Most Underrated Football Team

The Big Lead recently released their most over and underrated college football teams of the last decade, and you can guess which list the Frogs found themselves on.

While three Big 12 programs found themselves on the overrated list (WVU, Texas, and Oklahoma), TCU tied for sixth (with Stanford) for perpetually underrated programs. They were joined by the Baylor Bears, who finished ninth on the ten team list.

#6T TCU Horned Frogs (8 seasons ranked preseason, 7 seasons ranked post, +32)

Other than the first two years in the Big 12, TCU with Gary Patterson has been a steady and dominant power over the last decade. Consistently ranked in the preseason, they’ve still outperformed that by finishing Top 8 in half the seasons this decade. For some perspective, that’s the same number of times that Florida and Georgia–combined–have finished ranked in the Top 8 this decade. Yet, they don’t get the same respect in the preseason.

TCU fans have long complained that a national media bias exists against the small school powerhouse, and they may have a point. Other than the 2015 season, where the Frogs started the season as a top five team, Gary Patterson's group has found themselves in the lower half of the top 25 or unranked more often than not. Though the first two years in a Power Five conference proved challenging, once GP was able to recruit with the Big 12 name behind him and get the Frogs' depth up to par with his opponents, TCU got right back to their winning ways, averaging 10 wins per season and posting only a pair of campaigns that saw them win less than eight games. The Frogs made a bowl game in all but one of the last ten years, and won three BCS Bowls in the same span. They have seven top two conference finishes, including a Big 12 title and three Mountain West crowns, and five top ten finishes in the final college football polls.

Armed with that information, it's almost surprising that the Frogs didn't finish higher among underrated programs. They were beaten out by two Big 12 expansion candidates - Boise State, who finished fourth, and Cincinnati, who was rated as the most underrated program in the country. BYU, whom many consider to be the best possible addition to the conference, was listed eighth.

And because we know you want to know, there were three SEC program on the overrated list - Florida, LSU, and title holder Georgia.

Stay tuned for to see where TCU lands this fall, as both the Coaches and AP Polls should release in mid-August.