Penn State football tumbled five spots to No. 9 in this week’s College Football Playoff top 25 rankings.

Penn State is the third-highest Big Ten team in the rankings behind No. 2 Ohio State and No. 8 Minnesota, which jumped up nine spots following its victory over the Nittany Lions on Saturday afternoon. Interestingly, none of last week’s top 25 teams held their spot in this week’s rankings.

The Nittany Lions’ slide from No. 4 was a result of their 31-26 defeat to the Golden Gophers. Sean Clifford’s three-interception performance was key in Penn State suffering its first defeat since the 2019 Citrus Bowl, but the team’s secondary was picked apart by Tanner Morgan, who completed 18 of his 20 pass attempts for 339 yards and three touchdowns on Saturday.

At this time last year, James Franklin’s program had a 6-3 record and was ranked at No. 20 by the College Football Playoff committee following a 42-7 blowout loss to Michigan at the Big House in Ann Arbor. It ended the regular season at No. 12 in the poll prior to the Citrus Bowl.

In addition to this new ranking, Penn State fell in both the AP Top 25 and Coaches’ Polls this week. The team checked in at No. 9 and No. 11, respectively, in those polls. The top four teams in the final College Football Playoff rankings will play in the Peach and Fiesta Bowls, and the winners of those games will play for a national championship on January 13 at the Mercedes-Benz Superdome in New Orleans.

No. 9 Penn State (8-1, 5-1 Big Ten) will take on Indiana (7-2, 4-2 Big Ten), which is unranked in the College Football Playoff rankings despite earning the No. 24 spot in the AP Top 25 poll, at noon Saturday back at Beaver Stadium. The contest will be broadcast nationally on ABC as the Nittany Lions will get a shot to extend their Beaver Stadium winning streak to eight games.