Southington High School has won two straight CIAC championships, a state-best 21 straight games and has a Division I quarterback.

It’s no surprise, then, that the Blue Knights are overwhelmingly ranked No. 1 in the season debut of The Day's Top 10 high school state coaches’ poll.

Southington (1-0) received 11 out of 13 first-place votes. Class L-Large champion New Canaan and rival Darien are second and third, respectively, each receiving a first-place vote despite opening the season with byes.

Southington opened its season with a 54-9 dismantling of Manchester last Friday. Second-year quarterback Jasen Rose completed 15 of 20 passes for 303 yards and six touchdowns. Rose is expected to choose between Syracuse and UConn.

Southington returned the majority of its offense, including running backs Alessio Diana and Vance Upham. Diana ran eight times for 127 yards and a touchdown and caught four passes for 127 yards and two scores in the Manchester win.

Nine starters graduated from Southington’s ferocious defense, but coach Mike Drury said it will be the fastest defense of his five-year career.

Notre Dame of West Haven (1-0) is fourth and Class L-Small champion Windsor (1-0) is fifth.

 Shelton (1-0), West Haven (1-0), Class M-Large champion Brookfield (1-0), Ansonia (0-0) and Newtown (1-0) round out the Top 10.

Ledyard (1-0), Norwich Free Academy (0-0) and New London (1-0) were the local teams that received votes.

The poll features a balanced number of voters from conferences across the state to avoid any parochialism or charges that one region is represented more than others. There are two voters from each the state’s largest leagues — the Central Connecticut Conference, Eastern Connecticut Conference, Fairfield County Interscholastic Athletic Conference, Naugatuck Valley League, Southern Connecticut Conference and the South-West Conference. The Pequot Football Conference has one voter.

The ECC is represented by Ledyard's Jim Buonocore and Montville's Tanner Grove while the PFC is represented by Valley Regional/Old Lyme's Tim King.

n.griffen@theday.com

Twitter: @MetalNED