Rio Rancho High School has received enough respect to be slotted as the seventh-best team in Class 5A this week in the inaugural football poll of the season.

The Rams’ 2008 schedule has five top-10 opponents, including the third-ranked team in 5A and 4A’s No. 2 team.

Not surprisingly, the perennial championship contenders, Las Cruces, Mayfield, Clovis and La Cueva were ranked, respectively, 1-2-3-4. Rio Rancho’s longtime rival, Cibola, ranks fifth in the poll, compiled by members of the New Mexico High School Coaches Association.

In addition to the third-ranked Wildcats, who play host to the Rams on Sept. 26, No. 8 Manzano meets the Rams this season. The Monarchs are at Rio Rancho Stadium on Oct. 3 in the annual homecoming game.

Two other 5A teams on the Rams’ schedule, Hobbs, which received 25 points from coaches, and Carlsbad (8), just missed the top 10.

Hobbs is here in the opener Friday, while Carlsbad visits on Oct. 17.

Two top-10 teams in Class 4A are also on the Rams’ schedule: No. 2 Goddard entertains the Rams on Sept. 19, while No. 9 Piedra Vista plays host to Rio Rancho on Oct. 10.

The remaining team on the Rams’ schedule, 4A’s Roswell, which is here Sept. 5, received just two votes in that poll, matching West Mesa in 5A.

Perennial 4A state champion Artesia, no longer on the Rams’ schedule after the Bulldogs won all eight meetings from 2000-2007, are atop that class’s poll. Not enough coaches participated for polls to be compiled in classes 3A, 2A and 1A.

The NMHSCA is an organization of the coaches by the coaches that has been in existent since 1937. Members of the organization, including 95 percent of the head coaches in New Mexico, decided to develop a Top-10 poll in football and volleyball.

“The idea is to help the media and allow media to be able to publish the Top 10 each week and to help coaches because they now only have to complete one poll per week rather than a host of polls,” explained Thomas “Buster” Mabrey, the new executive director of the NMHSCA. “For the association to publish a poll, at least 10 head coaches must complete the poll. We will work within our organization to get more and more each week with the goal being 100 percent participation.”

KRQE-TV, which last season began an “all classes top-13” poll, is expected to compile its first poll of the season in another week or two. The state’s media members do that ranking.