College Sports Facts & Lore

Navy needed three overtimes to end Notre Dame's 43-game winning streak in the series.

The 1998 Temple team lost ten games and still beat a ranked Virginia Tech team on the road.

Georgia Tech scored 32 touchdowns against Cumberland and did not throw a touchdown pass.

Notre Dame ended UCLA's 88-game winning streak in 1974.

Georgia Tech beat Cumberland 222-0 in 1916.

Washington was ranked in the AP top 20 when it lost at home to FCS Montana in 2021.

Washington State quarterback Anthony Gordon threw nine touchdown passes against UCLA in 2019 and lost.

College football played decades without a legal forward pass.

Texas stopped USC on fourth-and-2 before Vince Young's winning drive in the 2006 Rose Bowl.

Kansas had lost 56 straight Big 12 road games before winning at Texas in 2021.

Michigan dropped out of the AP poll after opening 2007 with a home loss to Appalachian State.

Wake Forest and Virginia Tech were tied 0-0 at the end of regulation in 2014.

Iowa won its 2022 opener 7-3 without scoring a touchdown.

The 1985 Villanova title team remains the lowest-seeded men's national champion.

LSU's live mascot tradition began decades before Tiger Stadium became Death Valley.

Purdue had the national player of the year when it lost to Fairleigh Dickinson in 2023.

Temple beat No. 14 Virginia Tech in 1998 after entering the game 0-6.

Kansas was ranked No. 2 in the BCS standings in November 2007.

Michigan had the ball, the lead and fourth down with ten seconds left before losing to Michigan State in 2015.

Wisconsin had the FBS single-game rushing record for seven days in 2014.

NC State needed to win the ACC tournament just to make the 1983 NCAA tournament.

Chris Davis returned Alabama's missed field goal for the final points of Auburn's 34-28 win in 2013.

Arkansas and Kentucky combined for 134 points in a seven-overtime SEC game in 2003.

Fairleigh Dickinson beat Purdue 63-58 after losing the NEC title game by one point.

Colorado's 1990 season included a 31-31 tie against Tennessee in the opener.

Yale entered the 1968 Harvard game undefeated and left with a tie that felt like a loss.

Georgia Tech and Tulane both left the SEC before the conference became a football superpower brand.

Ohio State beat Miami in double overtime in the 2003 Fiesta Bowl to win the national title.

Northwestern led Michigan State by 35 points in the third quarter in 2006 and lost.

LSU went 15-0 in 2019 and beat seven teams ranked in the top ten at the time of the game.

Auburn, USC and Oklahoma all finished the 2004 regular season undefeated, and Auburn was left out.

Chicago's old Big Ten football program produced the first Heisman winner.

Michigan State's final play against Michigan in 2015 was officially a 38-yard fumble return touchdown.

Oklahoma won four straight Division I softball national championships from 2021 through 2024.

The Heisman had no freshman winners before 2012, then had two in two seasons.

The 2016 Alamo Bowl went from 31-0 Oregon to 47-41 TCU.

Colorado split the 1990 national title with Georgia Tech.

Auburn has both a tiger mascot and an eagle flight on game day.

Stanford's starting quarterback in the 2007 USC upset was Tavita Pritchard.

Colgate's 1932 team did not receive a Rose Bowl invitation despite never being scored on.

David Klingler threw for 716 yards against Arizona State in 1990.

John Heisman coached the winning side of college football's 222-0 game.

Auburn won the 2010 national title on a field goal with no time left.

Caitlin Clark became the NCAA Division I all-time scoring leader in 2024.

Tua Tagovailoa threw the national-title-winning touchdown as a freshman backup quarterback.

Texas Tech was ranked No. 7 when it beat No. 1 Texas in Lubbock in 2008.

Patrick Mahomes threw for 734 yards against Oklahoma in 2016 and lost.

Johnny Manziel beat Alabama in Tuscaloosa during his Heisman season.

The forward pass was first allowed the same year college football created the neutral zone.

UMBC had never won an NCAA tournament game before beating No. 1 overall seed Virginia.

Kansas beat Texas 57-56 in Austin in 2021 after entering the game 1-8.

Illinois and Penn State combined for two points across the first five overtime periods in 2021.

Troy led Appalachian State by two points with two seconds left in 2022 and lost on a deflected pass.

The 1966 Texas Western title game changed the racial history of major college basketball.

Texas Western won the 1966 national title; the school is now UTEP.

Ohio State entered Purdue in 2018 undefeated and left with a 29-point loss.

UCF claimed a national championship for its 13-0 season in 2017.

Cardale Jones made three starts in 2014: the Big Ten title game, the Sugar Bowl and the national championship game.

Arkansas played a seven-overtime game for the second time in three seasons in 2003.

Kansas scored 57 points at Texas in 2021 after entering the game 1-8.

Notre Dame scored 44 points against Navy in 2007 and still lost.

Ohio State entered the 2003 Fiesta Bowl as a double-digit underdog and won the national title.

Nick Saban's Toledo team in 1990 allowed more than 14 points only once.

Alabama played an all-SEC regular season in 2020 and won every game by at least 15 points.

Auburn went from 3-9 in 2012 to the national championship game in 2013.

Sewanee played five road games in six days in 1899 and won all five.

Sewanee beat Texas, Texas A&M, Tulane, LSU and Ole Miss on the same six-day road trip in 1899.

Colorado won the 1990 AP national title with one loss, one tie and a fifth-down win.

Texas A&M and LSU combined for 146 points in the highest-scoring FBS game ever.

Chicago left the Big Ten after dropping major-college football.

South Carolina beat Iowa in the 2024 national championship game to finish 38-0.

The NCAA once considered a rule that would have required football fields to be green.

Houston beat SMU 95-21 in 1989, SMU's first season back from the NCAA death penalty.

Oklahoma won 47 straight games from 1953 to 1957.

The 2014 Wake Forest-Virginia Tech game had no points in the first sixty minutes.

The first legal forward pass in college football was thrown by Saint Louis in 1906.

Kentucky's only major-poll football national title claim comes from Bear Bryant's 1950 team.

LSU beat Oklahoma 63-28 in a playoff semifinal after leading 49-14 at halftime.

Maryland scored six second-half touchdowns at Miami in 1984.

Texas A&M's most famous football tradition started in Dallas, not College Station.

Auburn went 13-0 in 2004 and did not play for the BCS national championship.

Miami committed seven turnovers against Penn State in the 1987 Fiesta Bowl.

SMU's first season after the death penalty included a 74-point loss to Houston.

Nebraska finished No. 1 and Penn State finished No. 2 in the 1994 AP poll despite both teams going undefeated.

Oklahoma beat Texas for the 2024 softball national championship in its final season before joining the SEC.

Houston's run-and-shoot offense produced an 11-touchdown passing game before the Bowl Coalition era.

The SEC once included Georgia Tech, Tulane and Sewanee.

Rutgers and Princeton split two games in 1869 before faculty canceled the third.

California beat Stanford in 1982 on a five-lateral kickoff return through Stanford's band.

NC State beat Houston's Phi Slama Jama team in the 1983 national championship game.

Boise State tied Oklahoma on fourth-and-18 with a hook-and-lateral in the 2007 Fiesta Bowl.

Melvin Gordon broke the FBS single-game rushing record in 2014, and Samaje Perine broke it one week later.

Colorado finished No. 1 in the AP poll in 1990 despite a loss and a tie.

Georgia Tech left the SEC after the 1963 season and did not join the ACC until 1983.

Michigan's 1901 team finished 11-0 and outscored opponents 550-0.

Michigan State scored 38 unanswered points to beat Northwestern in 2006.

The 1971 final AP poll had Nebraska, Oklahoma and Colorado at No. 1, No. 2 and No. 3.

Yale's second Heisman came seven years before the first winner from Alabama.

South Carolina went 38-0 to win the 2024 women's national championship.

Georgia allowed 83 points in 15 games during its 2021 national-title season.

Clemson's Howard's Rock came from Death Valley, California.

Florida State finished in the AP top five for fourteen straight seasons from 1987 through 2000.

Appalachian State beat Troy in 2022 on a tipped Hail Mary as time expired.

Kansas State was ranked No. 1 in the BCS standings in 1998.

South Carolina's 2024 team became the first undefeated women's champion since UConn in 2016.

Iowa State trailed Oklahoma State by 17 points in 2011 and won 37-31.

Texas Western won the 1966 national title with a roster that had no player taller than 6-foot-8.

Iowa State beat No. 2 Oklahoma State in double overtime in 2011.

The first Heisman Trophy winner played at the University of Chicago.

Penn State averaged 47 points per game in 1994 and did not win the national title.

Nebraska missed a 45-yard field goal on the final play of the 1994 Orange Bowl.

Yale won back-to-back Heisman Trophies in 1936 and 1937.

The University of Chicago dropped major-college football four years after producing the first Heisman winner.

Bobby Bowden won his first national title after fourteen straight bowl appearances at Florida State.

Archie Griffin is the only two-time Heisman Trophy winner.

Florida State won the ACC in each of its first nine seasons in the league.

LSU scored 40 points after regulation at Texas A&M in 2018 and still lost.

Auburn went from 8-5 in 2009 to 14-0 in 2010.

Iowa's visiting locker room at Kinnick Stadium is painted pink.

Georgia won its first national title since 1980 by beating Alabama in the 2021 CFP title game.

Boise State beat Oklahoma in the 2007 Fiesta Bowl with a hook-and-lateral, a halfback pass and a Statue of Liberty play.

Oklahoma beat Texas Tech 66-59 in 2016 despite allowing 854 yards.

Michigan State's 2006 comeback at Northwestern was the largest in FBS history at the time.

The first college football game was played with 25 players on each side.

Iowa beat South Dakota State 7-3 in 2022 with a field goal and two safeties.

Washington's 1994 win at Miami was nicknamed Whammy in Miami.

Notre Dame ended Oklahoma's 47-game winning streak with a 7-0 win in Norman in 1957.

Miami entered the 1987 Fiesta Bowl 11-0 and lost by four points.

Georgia Tech won an SEC football title before it ever joined the ACC.

Villanova beat a Georgetown team led by Patrick Ewing in the 1985 title game.

Arkansas beat Ole Miss 58-56 in seven overtimes in 2001.

Fresno State entered the 2008 NCAA baseball tournament with 27 losses and won the national title.

Ohio State went 21-2-1 during Archie Griffin's two Heisman seasons.

Kansas State reached eleven straight bowls under Bill Snyder from 1993 through 2003.

Iowa's pink locker room became famous enough to survive multiple stadium renovations.

The first Heisman winner never played in the NFL.

South Dakota State held Iowa to 166 yards in 2022 and still lost 7-3.

Archie Griffin won two Heismans and never won a national championship as a player.

Georgia's home field is often called Between the Hedges because the hedges are part of the stadium layout.

Chaminade's 1982 win over Virginia helped inspire the Maui Invitational.

The 2019 UCLA-Washington State game had 130 combined points and a 32-point blown lead.

Michigan paid Appalachian State to come to Ann Arbor in 2007 and lost 34-32.

Auburn beat Oregon 22-19 in the BCS title game after Michael Dyer's run was ruled not down.

Cornell was unbeaten and ranked No. 2 when it gave back the 1940 Dartmouth game.

The SEC's original membership stretched beyond the modern football map.

Caitlin Clark passed Pete Maravich's Division I scoring record in her final regular-season home game.

Arkansas beat Kentucky 71-63 in seven overtimes in 2003.

Cornell forfeited a 1940 win over Dartmouth after film showed Cornell scored on an extra down.

Georgia beat Michigan and Alabama by a combined 35 points in the 2021 College Football Playoff.

Boise State trademarked the idea of non-green football fields.

Appalachian State beat No. 5 Michigan at Michigan Stadium in 2007.

Jameis Winston became the second freshman to win the Heisman one year after Johnny Manziel.

Nick Saban left Toledo after one season to become the Cleveland Browns' defensive coordinator.

Patrick Mahomes accounted for 819 total yards against Oklahoma in 2016.

The No. 2 team in the AP poll lost seven times during the 2007 regular season.

Oklahoma had back-to-back Heisman-winning quarterbacks in Baker Mayfield and Kyler Murray.

UMBC became the first men's No. 16 seed to beat a No. 1 seed in 2018.

Houston quarterback David Klingler threw 11 touchdown passes in one game in 1990.

Miami beat unbeaten Nebraska 31-30 in the Orange Bowl to win the 1983 national title.

Andre Ware threw six touchdown passes in Houston's 95-21 win over SMU in 1989.

Samaje Perine rushed for 427 yards against Kansas in 2014.

The Big Ten's Rose Bowl tie-in kept undefeated Penn State out of a national-title matchup in 1994.

The Army-Navy game is traditionally played after most of college football's regular season is over.

Rutgers beat Princeton 6-4 in the first college football game in 1869.

Boise State's winning play against Oklahoma in the 2007 Fiesta Bowl was snapped to one side and handed behind the quarterback's back.

Houston scored 95 points against a conference opponent in 1989.

TCU scored 51 points in a CFP semifinal and seven points in the CFP championship game the next week.

Sewanee outscored five major Southern opponents 91-0 during one road trip in 1899.

Hayden Fry had Iowa's visiting locker room painted pink after taking over the program.

Nebraska went for two instead of a tie against Miami in the 1984 Orange Bowl and lost by one.

UCLA's 67-63 win at Washington State included a 100-yard kickoff return touchdown and a blocked-punt touchdown.

Washington's 64-game unbeaten streak included 59 wins and five ties.

Fresno State had to win the WAC tournament to make the 2008 NCAA baseball tournament.

LSU beat Alabama, Georgia, Oklahoma and Clemson in its final four games of 2019.

TCU was picked seventh in the Big 12 preseason poll before reaching the 2022 CFP title game.

Joe Burrow threw seven touchdown passes in the first half of LSU's 2019 Peach Bowl win over Oklahoma.

Clemson's players run down a hill before home games because the stadium was built below the road.

Purdue's 2018 upset of Ohio State came in a night game attended by Tyler Trent.

Nebraska entered the 1984 Orange Bowl undefeated and No. 1, then lost by one point.

Virginia lost to Chaminade in 1982 before the game was even part of a tournament.

Appalachian State scored the winning touchdown against Troy in 2022 on a ball caught short of the goal line.

BYU's 1984 national title is the last AP title won by a current non-power-conference program.

Gil Dobie coached Washington through its 64-game unbeaten streak.

Georgia Tech has national titles from seasons played as an independent, SEC member and ACC member.

Archie Griffin won the Heisman in 1974 and 1975.

Florida State played for the national title in three straight seasons from 1998 through 2000.

Michigan did not allow a point during the entire 1901 season.

Iowa reached back-to-back national championship games with Caitlin Clark in 2023 and 2024.

Bill Walton made 21 of 22 shots in the 1973 national championship game.

The Big Ten's original members included a school that no longer plays Division I football.

Kinnick Stadium's visiting locker room uses pink walls, lockers and showers.

The 1990 Colorado-Missouri game is remembered for a scoring play that came on fifth down.

Kansas State went 0-26-1 in the 27 games before Bill Snyder's first season.

NC State won nine straight elimination games to finish the 1983 season.

Tennessee's pregame T is formed by the marching band, not a tunnel structure.

Oregon's teams were once commonly called the Webfoots before Ducks became standard.

The Army-Navy game was played during World War II.

The 2018 Texas A&M-LSU game lasted seven overtimes and ended with a two-point conversion.

Louisville lost to Kentucky in Lamar Jackson's Heisman season.

Auburn beat both Alabama and Georgia in 2017, then lost to unbeaten UCF in the Peach Bowl.

Fresno State beat Georgia in the 2008 College World Series finals.

Nick Saban's first college head-coaching job was at Toledo, not LSU or Michigan State.

Harvard scored sixteen points in the final 42 seconds against Yale in 1968.

Stanford beat No. 2 USC in 2007 as a 41-point underdog.

Charlie Ward won the Heisman and the national championship in the same season at Florida State.

Miami had won 34 straight games before losing to Ohio State in the 2003 Fiesta Bowl.

The 1982 Cal-Stanford game ended 25-20 after a kickoff return that started with four seconds left.

Oklahoma State scored 31 points at Iowa State in 2011 and lost for the first time that season.

David Klingler threw 54 touchdown passes during the 1990 season.

Montana beat No. 20 Washington 13-7 in Seattle in 2021.

Baker Mayfield threw seven touchdown passes against Texas Tech in 2016 and did not throw an interception.

Miami's dynasty began with a national-title season that started with a 25-point loss.

DeVonta Smith won the 2020 Heisman Trophy as a wide receiver.

The 2003 Arkansas-Kentucky game was tied 24-24 at the end of regulation and finished 71-63.

Bear Bryant's Kentucky team ended Oklahoma's 31-game winning streak in the 1951 Sugar Bowl.

Auburn's teams are the Tigers, but the battle cry is War Eagle.

Tony Dorsett rushed for more than 1,000 yards in all four seasons at Pitt.

UCLA won 88 straight men's basketball games from 1971 to 1974.

Cumberland finished with zero first downs in its 222-0 loss to Georgia Tech.

Barry Sanders rushed for 2,628 yards and 37 touchdowns in 1988, not counting his bowl game.

Fairleigh Dickinson beat Purdue despite being the shortest team in Division I men's basketball.

Stanford beat USC 24-23 in 2007 after trailing by nine points in the fourth quarter.

Tennessee's checkerboard end zones became a Neyland Stadium signature before the modern SEC expansion era.

Yale has as many Heisman winners as Georgia.

Auburn's War Eagle tradition traces to a football game against Georgia in the 1890s.

The Harvard Crimson student paper headlined the 1968 tie as Harvard Beats Yale 29-29.

Stetson Bennett began his Georgia career as a walk-on and ended the 2021 season as the title-game offensive MVP.

Baker Mayfield walked on at Texas Tech and Oklahoma before winning the Heisman.

Iowa scored seven points against South Dakota State in 2022 without ever reaching the end zone.

Villanova shot 78.6 percent from the field to beat Georgetown in the 1985 national championship game.

Temple beat Virginia Tech 28-24 in 1998 despite finishing 1-10.

The 1940 Cornell-Dartmouth game is one of college football's rare postgame forfeits for sportsmanship.

Jay Berwanger won the first Heisman in 1935 and was also the first NFL Draft pick.

The first Rose Bowl was so one-sided that the event did not bring football back for fourteen years.

Villanova won the 1985 national title as a No. 8 seed.

Stanford quit the first Rose Bowl with more than eight minutes left.

Caitlin Clark made more than 500 three-pointers in her college career.

Alabama won the 2017 national title on a second-and-26 touchdown pass in overtime.

Bear Bryant won the SEC at Kentucky before he coached Alabama.

Pitt's last national title came in Tony Dorsett's senior season.

Alabama attempted a 57-yard field goal with one second left before Auburn's Kick Six.

BYU won the 1984 national championship after beating 6-5 Michigan in the Holiday Bowl.

Johnny Manziel became the first freshman to win the Heisman in 2012.

Missouri led Colorado 31-27 before the fifth-down sequence in 1990.

Fresno State won the 2008 College World Series as a No. 4 regional seed.

LSU's live tiger mascot is named after trainer Mike Chambers.

Sewanee's 1899 team traveled by train and won five games before coming home.

TCU became the first Big 12 team to win a College Football Playoff game.

The visiting locker room at Iowa is one of college football's most literal home-field advantages.

Vince Young accounted for 467 yards against USC in the 2006 Rose Bowl.

Maryland trailed Miami 31-0 at halftime in 1984 and won 42-40.

Bear Bryant coached Kentucky, Texas A&M and Alabama before becoming an Alabama statue.

Chaminade beat No. 1 Virginia and Ralph Sampson in 1982.

Clemson's entrance is built around a rock that was given to Frank Howard in the 1960s.

Texas lost to Kansas at home in football for the first time in 2021.

Tulane has more SEC football titles than several current SEC members.

South Florida reached No. 2 in the BCS standings in October 2007.

Penn State beat Oregon 38-20 in the Rose Bowl to finish 12-0 in 1994.

TCU reached the 2022 national championship game one season after going 5-7.

College football's first game was played six years before the first Kentucky Derby.

Arkansas and Ole Miss played the first seven-overtime game in major college football history.

Dawn Staley won her third national championship with South Carolina in 2024.

Lamar Jackson rushed for 1,571 yards as a quarterback in 2016.

Florida State finished No. 4 or better in the AP poll every year from 1987 through 1996.

Virginia's title run came one tournament after the most famous first-round loss in men's NCAA history.

Washington's longest unbeaten run ended before the AP poll existed.

Michigan led Michigan State by two points with ten seconds left in 2015 and lost without running another offensive play.

Miami opened the 1983 season with a 28-3 loss to Florida and finished No. 1.

Lamar Jackson accounted for 51 touchdowns during his Heisman season.

Auburn beat Georgia on the Prayer at Jordan-Hare and Alabama on the Kick Six in the same month.

Tony Dorsett won the 1976 Heisman while leading Pitt to a 12-0 national-title season.

Virginia lost to a No. 16 seed in 2018 and won the national title in 2019.

Michigan State beat Michigan in 2015 on a fumbled punt return touchdown as time expired.

John Heisman coached at Georgia Tech before the Heisman Trophy was named for him.

Nebraska beat Oklahoma, Colorado and Alabama during its 13-0 season in 1971.

Appalachian State beat Texas A&M on the road and Troy on a walk-off Hail Mary in back-to-back weeks in 2022.

Fresno State's 2008 baseball title is one of the lowest-seeded championship runs in NCAA history.

Alabama went 13-0 in 2020 while playing only Power Five opponents.

Ohio State won the first College Football Playoff after starting the postseason as the No. 4 seed.

Boise State became nationally identified by its field before it became a BCS-bowl program.

Appalachian State was still an FCS program when it beat Michigan in 2007.

Lamar Jackson won the 2016 Heisman while playing for a Louisville team that lost its final two games.

Michigan beat Stanford 49-0 in the first Rose Bowl.

The Heisman Trophy is named for a coach, not for a former winner.

Illinois beat Penn State 20-18 in nine overtimes in 2021.

Georgia's hedges were planted around Sanford Stadium in 1929.

Ohio State used three starting quarterbacks during its 2014 national-title season.

Florida State won its first national title by beating Nebraska 18-16 in the Orange Bowl after the 1993 season.

UMBC beat Virginia by 20 points in the first 16-over-1 upset in men's NCAA tournament history.

Iowa scored a then-record 170 team points at the 1997 NCAA wrestling championships.

Purdue scored 49 points against an Ohio State team that entered the game 7-0 in 2018.

Oregon's Duck mascot has roots in a handshake agreement with Walt Disney.

Temple's 1998 upset at Virginia Tech was its only win of the season.

Auburn won the SEC in 2004 with a perfect record and ended the season in the Sugar Bowl.

Fairleigh Dickinson became the second men's No. 16 seed to beat a No. 1 seed in 2023.

Oregon's mascot looks like Donald Duck because of a Disney connection.

Georgia Southern beat Florida in 2013 without completing a pass.

Florida State won the 1993 national title in a game where Nebraska had the last kick.

Army and Navy players stand together for both alma maters after their game.

The 1984 Orange Bowl helped turn Miami into a national football brand.

BYU started the 1984 season by beating No. 3 Pitt on the road.

Neyland Stadium's capacity has topped 100,000 for Tennessee home games.

Jameis Winston won the Heisman and the national championship in the same freshman season.

Virginia trailed Purdue by three with less than six seconds left in the 2019 Elite Eight and still advanced.

Cal's final touchdown against Stanford in 1982 counted with Stanford band members on the field.

Oklahoma went unbeaten for more than four calendar years during its 47-game winning streak.

Virginia won the 2019 men's national title one year after losing to a No. 16 seed.

The final score of Michigan State's 35-point comeback at Northwestern was 41-38.

The team that ended Oklahoma's record winning streak in 1957 had lost to Oklahoma 40-0 the year before.

TCU's quarterback was suspended before the 2016 Alamo Bowl, then TCU erased a 31-point deficit.

Bobby Bowden's Florida State teams finished every season from 1987 to 2000 with at least ten wins.

John Elway's final regular-season college game ended with Cal's five-lateral kickoff return.

Nick Saban's first head-coaching season ended with Toledo tied for the MAC title.

Mike the Tiger lives on campus near Tiger Stadium.

Kentucky beat Oklahoma in the Sugar Bowl after the 1950 season under Bear Bryant.

Joe Burrow threw 60 touchdown passes during LSU's 2019 national-title season.

Georgia sacked Tua Tagovailoa for a 16-yard loss one play before Alabama's 2017 title-winning touchdown.

Texas won the 2005 national title with a quarterback who ran for 200 yards in the title game.

Boise State installed blue football turf in 1986.

Colgate outscored opponents 264-0 in 1932.

Notre Dame beat Navy 43 straight times before Navy won in triple overtime in 2007.

Howard's Rock was once used as a doorstop before becoming a Clemson football tradition.

UCF was ranked No. 12 in the final College Football Playoff rankings before finishing undefeated in 2017.

Barry Sanders had four 300-yard rushing games in 1988.

Iowa wrestling won 25 consecutive Big Ten team titles from 1974 through 1998.

Miami led Maryland by 31 points before losing by two in 1984.

Lorenzo Charles scored the 1983 title-winning basket by catching Dereck Whittenburg's airball.

Texas Tech went 11-2 in 2008 after opening the season outside the AP top ten.

BYU finished 13-0 in 1984 and won a national title without playing in a major New Year's bowl.

Oklahoma's 2023 softball team went 61-1 and won the national championship.

Frank Reich came off the bench to lead Maryland's 31-point comeback against Miami in 1984.

John Heisman coached Georgia Tech in the 222-0 Cumberland game.

The 1984 Maryland-Miami game turned a 31-0 halftime score into a 42-40 Maryland win.

Iowa's defense outscored its offense 4-3 against South Dakota State in 2022.

Colorado beat Notre Dame 10-9 in the Orange Bowl to finish its 1990 national title season.

Baker Mayfield became the first former walk-on to win the Heisman Trophy.

Florida lost to Georgia Southern in 2013 even though Georgia Southern went 0-for-3 passing.

The University of Chicago was a founding Big Ten member.

Georgia Southern was still an FCS program when it won at Florida in 2013.

Miami won the 1983 national championship after stopping Nebraska's two-point conversion attempt.

Colgate's 1932 nickname became one of college football's cleanest four-word season summaries.

Saint Louis went unbeaten in 1906 while using the newly legalized forward pass.

Georgia Southern rushed for 429 yards at Florida in 2013 and finished with zero passing yards.

Purdue beat undefeated No. 2 Ohio State 49-20 in 2018.

Oregon's Duck survived a Disney review because of a long-running informal agreement.

UCLA lost to Notre Dame in 1974 after leading by eleven points with less than four minutes left.

Texas A&M's 74-72 win over LSU had the same number of overtimes as regulation touchdowns by both teams combined.

Georgia Tech won SEC football titles before becoming an ACC school.

Miami won 58 straight home games from 1985 to 1994.

UCLA scored 50 second-half points at Washington State in 2019.

Texas A&M's 12th Man tradition began when E. King Gill stood ready to play in the 1922 Dixie Classic.

Harvard tied Yale 29-29 in 1968 after trailing 29-13 with 42 seconds left.

Georgia Tech led Cumberland 126-0 at halftime in 1916.

Villanova committed only eight turnovers in the 1985 national championship game.

NC State won the 1983 men's national title on a dunk at the buzzer.

Mac Jones, DeVonta Smith and Najee Harris all finished in the top five of the 2020 Heisman vote.

Kentucky scored 63 points against Arkansas in 2003 and lost.

The 1968 Harvard-Yale game ended in a tie and still became one of the rivalry's most famous games.

Ole Miss scored 56 points against Arkansas in 2001 and lost.

Nebraska scored with 48 seconds left against Miami in the Orange Bowl and chose not to kick for the tie.

Wake Forest beat Virginia Tech 6-3 in double overtime in 2014.

Larry Kelley and Clint Frank gave Yale consecutive Heisman winners before World War II.

The first Heisman winner came from a school that later left the Big Ten.

Texas Tech beat No. 1 Texas in 2008 on a Michael Crabtree touchdown with one second left.

SMU returned from the NCAA death penalty in 1989 and allowed 95 points at Houston.

Boise State's field is officially nicknamed The Blue.

Miami went nearly a decade without losing a home football game before Washington beat the Hurricanes in 1994.

USC entered the 2006 Rose Bowl on a 34-game winning streak and lost by three.

Auburn finished the 2004 regular season undefeated and ranked No. 3 in the BCS.

Virginia was the No. 1 overall seed when UMBC beat the Cavaliers 74-54.

Appalachian State's 2022 win over Troy ended with fans rushing the field after a Sun Belt game.

UCF went 13-0 in 2017 and did not make the College Football Playoff.

USC had won 35 straight home games before Stanford beat the Trojans in 2007.

Ohio State won the 2002 national title despite scoring more than 28 points only once after September.

Yale had two Heisman winners before any SEC player won the award.

Eli Manning threw six touchdown passes in the 2001 Arkansas-Ole Miss seven-overtime game and lost.

Barry Sanders averaged 238.9 rushing yards per game during the 1988 regular season.

Penn State finished 12-0 in 1986 after winning a national-title game as a heavy underdog.

Penn State beat Miami 14-10 in the 1987 Fiesta Bowl despite being outgained 445-162.

Boise State finished 13-0 after beating Oklahoma in overtime in the 2007 Fiesta Bowl.

Washington's record unbeaten streak lasted across parts of eleven seasons.

Georgia removed and replanted the Sanford Stadium hedges for Olympic soccer in 1996.

Baker Mayfield threw 43 touchdown passes and six interceptions in his Heisman season.

Kansas State had one bowl appearance in school history before Bill Snyder arrived.

Georgia's most famous stadium feature was installed the year the stadium opened.

Auburn's eagle flies before home games even though the mascot name is Tigers.

Melvin Gordon rushed for 408 yards against Nebraska in 2014 and did not play the fourth quarter.

Houston scored 84 points against Eastern Washington in David Klingler's 11-touchdown game.

Georgia Tech played nearly two decades as an independent between SEC and ACC membership.

Tennessee's stadium is named for a coach whose teams won four national titles.

Appalachian State blocked a Michigan field goal on the final play to finish the 2007 upset.

Texas beat USC 41-38 in the 2006 Rose Bowl on Vince Young's fourth-down touchdown run.

Texas Tech and Oklahoma combined for 1,708 yards in 2016.

Colorado beat Missouri in 1990 after being given a fifth down at the goal line.

Nebraska's 1971 team went 13-0 while playing three teams that finished in the final AP top four.

Wake Forest won an ACC game in 2014 without scoring in regulation.

Alabama did not win the SEC in 2017 but still won the national championship.

The 2003 Fiesta Bowl title game included a late pass-interference flag that kept Ohio State alive.

Penn State won the 1986 national title by intercepting Vinny Testaverde five times.

Dan Gable coached Iowa to fifteen NCAA wrestling team titles.

Ohio State allowed four fourth-quarter touchdowns at Purdue in 2018.

Texas Tech led Texas 19-0 in 2008, lost the lead, then won with one second left.

Virginia Tech was a four-touchdown favorite when Temple won in Blacksburg in 1998.

Virginia had Ralph Sampson and was ranked No. 1 when it lost to Chaminade in Hawaii.

Barry Sanders won the 1988 Heisman after spending the previous season behind Thurman Thomas at Oklahoma State.

Texas Western started five Black players in the 1966 men's national championship game and beat Kentucky.

Stanford was 1-3 when it beat No. 2 USC at the Coliseum in 2007.

TCU beat Michigan 51-45 in the 2022 Fiesta Bowl.

Miami's home winning streak lasted through five national-title seasons.

Texas A&M beat LSU 74-72 in seven overtimes in 2018.

The first college football game looked closer to soccer than modern football.

Nebraska finished No. 1 in 1971 after beating the teams that finished No. 2, No. 3 and No. 4 in the final AP poll.

The hedges at Sanford Stadium are older than the SEC.

Caitlin Clark finished at Iowa with 3,951 points, the most in Division I history.

BYU ended its 1984 title season in the Holiday Bowl instead of the Orange, Sugar, Cotton or Rose Bowl.

Illinois and Penn State played nine overtimes and scored 38 total points.

UCF beat Auburn in the 2018 Peach Bowl to finish the 2017 season unbeaten.

Nick Saban went 9-2 in his only season as Toledo's head coach.

Michigan State reached the 2015 College Football Playoff after a season that included the blocked-punt win at Michigan.

Penn State went 12-0 in 1994 and finished No. 2 in the AP poll.

Jay Berwanger was selected first in the first NFL Draft and chose not to sign.

Washington opened 2021 with a home loss to an FCS team and still had Michigan on the schedule the next week.

Virginia beat Texas Tech 85-77 in overtime to win the 2019 national title.

Ohio State beat Alabama and Oregon in back-to-back games to win the 2014 national title.

Washington went 64 straight games without a loss from 1907 to 1917.

Nebraska beat Alabama 38-6 in the Orange Bowl to finish the 1971 season.

Chaminade was an NAIA program when it upset Virginia in 1982.

College football legalized the forward pass in 1906 after a wave of safety reforms.

War Eagle is a greeting, a chant and a tradition at a school whose nickname is Tigers.

Army and Navy first played football against each other in 1890.

Clemson players touch Howard's Rock before running down the hill at Memorial Stadium.

Sewanee finished 12-0 in 1899 after playing eleven of its twelve games away from home.

Oregon led TCU 31-0 in the Alamo Bowl and did not score again until overtime.

Stanford had taken the lead with four seconds left before Cal's band-play return in 1982.

Colorado lost to Illinois in 1990 and still finished No. 1 in the AP poll.

John Heisman coached both football and baseball at Georgia Tech.

Miami won its first national championship in 1983 under Howard Schnellenberger.

Illinois beat No. 7 Penn State in 2021 after entering as a heavy road underdog.

Oklahoma State was 10-0 before losing at Iowa State in 2011.

Navy beat Notre Dame in 2007 for the first time since 1963.

Kansas won at Texas in 2021 on a two-point conversion in overtime.

Navy's 46-44 win over Notre Dame in 2007 ended a streak that had lasted more than four decades.

TCU trailed Oregon 31-0 at halftime of the 2016 Alamo Bowl and won 47-41 in triple overtime.

TCU tied the largest comeback in bowl history by beating Oregon after trailing by 31 points.

Texas A&M students stand throughout games because of the 12th Man tradition.

The 12th Man began with a former player called from the press box to the sideline.

LSU's first live tiger mascot arrived in 1936.

Auburn beat Alabama in 2013 on a 109-yard missed-field-goal return as time expired.

Auburn beat five ranked teams in 2004 and still missed the national-title game.

Georgia gave up more points to Alabama in the SEC title game than it allowed in its first eight games combined in 2021.

Dartmouth officially beat Cornell in 1940 after Cornell acknowledged the officials' mistake.

Colgate went undefeated, untied, unscored upon and uninvited in 1932.

Montana beat Washington in 2021 despite scoring one offensive touchdown.

Iowa's 1997 NCAA wrestling team had five individual national champions.

Tony Dorsett finished his college career with 6,082 rushing yards.

Archie Griffin played in four Rose Bowls at Ohio State.

Cornell's 1940 season included a loss that was not decided until after the game ended.

Baker Mayfield won the 2017 Heisman after transferring within the Big 12.

Oklahoma won 53 straight softball games during its 2023 national-title season.

Samaje Perine broke Melvin Gordon's rushing record in a game delayed by weather.

Lamar Jackson became Louisville's first Heisman Trophy winner.

E. King Gill never entered the game that created Texas A&M's 12th Man tradition.

Graham Harrell threw for 474 yards against Texas in Texas Tech's 2008 upset.

LSU won the 2007 national championship with two losses.

John Heisman coached at Auburn, Clemson, Georgia Tech, Penn and Rice.

Fairleigh Dickinson did not win its conference tournament before beating No. 1 seed Purdue.

LSU students helped raise money to buy the first Mike the Tiger.

Ohio State beat Wisconsin 59-0 in the 2014 Big Ten Championship with Cardale Jones making his first start.

UCLA won seven straight men's basketball national championships from 1967 through 1973.

Nebraska could have tied Miami in the 1984 Orange Bowl but went for two and lost 31-30.

Virginia needed overtime in both the 2019 national semifinal and national championship game.

The 2001 Arkansas-Ole Miss game was tied 17-17 after regulation and finished 58-56.

Oklahoma softball went 235-15 across its four-title run from 2021 through 2024.

Boise State won the 2007 Fiesta Bowl on a two-point conversion in overtime.

The first nine-overtime game in FBS history ended 20-18.

Cam Newton led Auburn to a 14-0 season one year after transferring from junior college.

Barry Sanders scored five touchdowns in the 1988 Holiday Bowl, but bowl stats did not count toward NCAA season totals then.

South Carolina finished undefeated in 2024 after losing all five starters from the previous season.

The Oregon Duck became one of college football's most recognizable mascots before Oregon became a national power.

Army and Navy both entered the 1945 game unbeaten and ranked No. 1 and No. 2.

Tennessee players have run through the Pride of the Southland Band's T since 1965.

Bill Snyder inherited a Kansas State program that had lost 26 of its previous 27 games.

Virginia Tech and Wake Forest combined for nine points across regulation and two overtimes in 2014.

Iowa State's 2011 upset helped keep Oklahoma State out of the BCS title game.

Florida paid Georgia Southern for a guarantee game in 2013 and lost 26-20.

Montana held Washington scoreless after the first quarter in its 2021 upset.

Pitt beat Georgia 27-3 in the Sugar Bowl to finish No. 1 in 1976.

Cam Newton won the Heisman and the national title in his only season as Auburn's starting quarterback.

Washington ended Miami's 58-game home winning streak in 1994.

Alabama scored at least 38 points in every game of its 2020 national-title season.

Texas Western's 1966 title team beat Adolph Rupp's Kentucky team 72-65.

UCLA trailed Washington State 49-17 in 2019 and won 67-63.

Colgate finished 9-0 in 1932 and did not allow a single point.

Sewanee was a founding SEC member and later left major college football.

Oklahoma's 47-game winning streak is still the longest in major college football history.

Michigan State trailed Northwestern 38-3 in 2006 and won 41-38.

Iowa won nine straight NCAA wrestling team titles from 1978 through 1986.

Missouri reached No. 1 in the BCS standings during the 2007 season.

Colorado's 1990 national title season included a win decided by an extra down.

Alabama trailed Georgia 13-0 at halftime of the 2017 national championship game and won in overtime.