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ST. LOUIS (PFL)  – For the first time since 2019, San Diego football has been tapped as the Pioneer Football League’s preseason favorite in the league’s 2025 Preseason Coaches Poll, released Monday.

Pioneer Football League
2025 Preseason Coaches’ Poll PL
Team
1st
2nd
3rd
Points
1. San Diego 5 4 1 94 2. Drake 3 2 1 78 3. St. Thomas 1 2 0 72 4. Butler 0 1 4 66 5. Dayton 0 1 2 65 6. Morehead St. 1 0 0 64 7. Presbyterian 1 1 1 55 8. Davidson 0 0 1 53 9. Marist 24 10. Valparaiso 18 11. Stetson 16
  • First-place votes in parentheses.
  • 10 points awarded for a first-place vote, with one point less for each succeeding place. (Maximum score = 100)
  • Coaches were not allowed to vote for their team.

The PFL will present its 2025 Preseason All-PFL Team on Tuesday.

San Diego picked up five first-place votes and was not ranked lower than third by any of the league’s head coaches to earn the poll’s top spot with 94 points.

Drake, the 2024 PFL Champion, was first on three ballots and was picked in the top three on six ballots to earn second in the poll with 78 points. St. Thomas, with 72 points, including a first-place vote, was third with 72 points.

Butler, Dayton, and Morehead State were tightly packed in the next three spots. Butler was fourth with 66 points thanks to five votes in the top three. Dayton was a point behind in fifth place at 65 points. Morehead State nabbed a first-place vote and was sixth in the poll with 65 points for its best preseason positioning since 2022, when it was picked fifth. 

Presbyterian had one vote for each of the top three spots and edged out Davidson for the No. 7 position in the poll with 55 points. Davidson was eighth with 53 points.
Marist, Valparaiso, and Stetson rounded out the PFL Preseason Coaches’ Poll, ranked ninth, 10th, and 11th, respectively.

The poll reflects the vastly different landscape in the PFL entering the 2025 season with five programs helmed by new head coaches: Kevin Lynch at Butler, Saj Thakkar at Davidson, Joe Woodley at Drake, Mike Jasper at Stetson, and Andy Waddle at Valparaiso.

The upcoming 2025 season marks the 33rd year of the Pioneer Football League. The league will feature 11 teams, each playing an eight-game schedule to determine the league champion and recipient of the automatic bid to the NCAA FCS Championship. The 2025 schedule gets underway Thursday, August 28, with Dayton, Drake, and St. Thomas set to kick off on opening night. Marist opens its season on Friday, August 29, followed by the league’s remaining seven teams on Saturday, August 30.

About the Pioneer Football League
The Pioneer Football League is the only non-scholarship, football-only NCAA Football Championship Subdivision conference. The PFL is a truly national conference with members on each coast and throughout the nation’s heartland. Butler University, the University of Dayton, Drake University, and Valparaiso University were among the league’s founding members in 1993, with Davidson College, Marist University, Morehead State University, Presbyterian College, the University of San Diego, the University of St. Thomas, and Stetson University joining to form the current 11-team league.