MKRob Sports

This will be an unranked season for the University of Southern California in USA Today’s football coaches’ poll.

Grant Teaff, the executive director of the American Football Coaches Association, told USA Today that because the school is under major NCAA sanctions and prohibited from playing in a bowl, it will be ineligible for the poll.

USC filed an appeal with the NCAA last month, asking that several sanctions on its football program be reduced because they are “too severe” and “inconsistent with precedent.”

USC appealed only certain aspects of the NCAA’s ruling. Among the penalties were a two-year bowl ban, four years of probation, scholarship losses and removal of several victories. The school will accept a bowl ban for the upcoming season and certain scholarship penalties in football, but believes the full sanctions were unduly harsh.

According to USA Today, it was expected that USC would be eligible for the coaches’ poll in 2010 because it planned an appeal but because the school accepted a postseason ban for this season, it became ineligible for the poll.

Teaff released a statement in which he said the AFCA informed USC athletic director Mike Garrett, USC coach Lane Kiffin, Pac-10 commissioner Larry Scott and BCS executive director Bill Hancock that the Trojans would be ineligible for the 2010 coaches’ poll.