Which college football teams are the most complete and talent-rich heading into the 2018 season?

Preseason magazine guru Phil Steele, who studies rosters and interviews coaches 12 months out of the year, believes he has an idea. He has compiled his annual 'Preseason Top 40' rankings, a list that's usually one of the most accurate nationally.

Steele notes two important guidelines about this year's rankings, which for this exercise have been trimmed to the first 25 teams. "My preseason rankings are not my power rankings," Steele writes. "These rankings take into account the totality of the circumstances that I feel each team will face in the 2018 season — schedule strength, foes' schedules (coming off byes), experience edges at the start of the year and so forth.

"My Top 40 is where I project teams to finish in the final rankings and have always done quite well. These rankings reflect not only talent, but the strength of schedule and how each team should finish the season. Over the past five years, 244 of the 274 teams that I have listed in my top rankings have made it to bowl eligibility and that is a solid 89 percent."

Here is a look at Steele's preseason Top 25 rankings for the 2018 season: