College football national championships in NCAA Division I FBS

A variety of selectors have named national champions throughout the years. They generally can be divided into four categories: those determined by mathematical formula, human polls, historical research, and recently, playoffs. The selectors below are listed in the official NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records as having been deemed to be "major selectors" for which the criterion is that the poll or selector be "national in scope either through distribution in newspaper, television, radio and/or computer online".[6] The former selectors, deemed instrumental in the sport of college football, and selectors that were included for the calculation of the BCS standing, are listed together.[6]

The mathematical system is the oldest systematic selector of college football national champions. Many of the math selectors were created during the "championship rush" of the 1920s and 1930s, beginning with Frank Dickinson's system, or during the dawn of the computer age in the 1990s. Selectors are listed below with years selected retroactively in italics.

^aThe NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records book shows Anderson & Hester listed as "Seattle Times."
^bThe Billingsley Report also provides an alternate selection that uses margin-of-victory in its calculation. The NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records book notes both selections in years where they disagree.[17]^{: 112–119 
c}Wolfe did not provide rankings for the 2020 season, stating that there were not "enough games played to allow meaningful analysis," due to the COVID-19 pandemic.[18]

The poll has been the dominant national champion selection method since the inception of the AP Poll in 1936. The National Football Foundation merged its poll with UPI from 1991 to 1992, with USA Today from 1993 to 1996, and with the FWAA since 2014.

For many years, the national champions of various polls were selected before the annual bowl games were played, by AP (1936–1964 and 1966–1967), Coaches Poll (1950–1973), FWAA (1954), and NFF (1959–1970). In all other latter-day polls, champions were selected after bowl games.[17]^{: 112–119}

During the BCS era, the winner of the BCS Championship Game was automatically awarded the national championship of the Coaches Poll and the National Football Foundation.

Selectors are listed below with years selected retroactively in italics.

^aAt the request of several schools, the AFCA established a "Blue Ribbon Commission" in 2016 to begin retroactively selecting Coaches' Trophy winners from 1922 through 1949.[19] Oklahoma State was the only team to apply for any of the 28 years considered (1945).[20] As yet, there are no selections for years other than 1945.

^bServed as the Coaches Poll during the designated years, but also conducted their own poll at different times.

^cThe Football Writers Association of America merged its poll with that of the National Football Foundation members beginning in 2014; as a result, the Grantland Trophy was retired and the FWAA/NFF national champion now receives the MacArthur Bowl.[17]^{: 113–114}

^dUSA Today took over, from the UPI, the poll of the National Football Foundation's members in 1993, and its winner was designated by the NFF as its national champion and received the MacArthur Bowl. The poll was conducted by USA Today through the 1996 season, although national championship selections in the NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records do not distinguish the NFF from the USAT/NFF poll in 1995 and 1996. Not to be confused with the USA Today/CNN Coaches Poll, which USA Today conducted separately.

^eUPI conducted the Coaches Poll through the 1990 season, which was subsequently taken over by CNN/USA Today. UPI then conducted a poll of National Football Foundation members in 1991 and 1992, the winner of which was designated by the NFF as its national champion and received the MacArthur Bowl.

^fUPI conducted its own poll from 1993 to 1995, after the National Football Foundation Poll was taken over by USA Today.

^gUSA Today conducted its own poll of college football sportswriters in 1982, then joined with CNN to do their own joint poll until they took over the Coaches Poll starting with the 1991 season.

^hThe Harris Interactive College Football Poll was contracted by the BCS to help formulate its standings. It did not conduct a final poll following the BCS National Championship Game or award or name a national champion on its own, so is not included in the table of national championship selections.[6]

College football historian Parke H. Davis is the only selector considered by the NCAA to have primarily used research in his selections.[17]^: 117 Davis did all of his work in 1933, naming retroactive national champions for most of the years from 1869 to 1932 while naming Michigan and Princeton (his alma mater) co-champions at the end of the 1933 season. In all, he selected 94 teams over 61 seasons as "Outstanding Nationwide and Sectional Teams." For 21 of these teams (at 12 schools), he was the only major selector to choose them. Their schools use 17 of Davis' singular selections to claim national titles. His work has been criticized for having a heavy Eastern bias, with little regard for the South and the West Coast.[21]

The Bowl Championship Series used a mathematical system that combined polls (Coaches and AP/Harris) and multiple computer rankings (including some individual selectors listed above) to determine a season ending matchup between its top two ranked teams in the BCS Championship Game. The champion of that game was contractually awarded the Coaches Poll and National Football Foundation championships.

Unlike all selectors prior to 2014, the College Football Playoff does not use math, polls or research to select the participants. Rather, a 13-member committee selects and seeds the teams.[22] The playoff system marked the first time any championship selector arranged a bracket competition to determine whom it would declare to be its champion.

Below is a list of the national champions of college football since 1869 chosen by NCAA-designated "major selectors" listed in the official Football Bowl Subdivision Records publication.[6]

Many teams did not have coaches as late as 1899. The first contemporaneous poll to include teams across the country and selection of a national champions can be traced to Caspar Whitney in 1901.[10] The last retroactive selection in the list is Clyde Berryman's choice of Notre Dame for 1989. The tie was removed from college football in 1995 and the last consensus champion with a tie in its record was Georgia Tech in 1990.

As designated by the official NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records publication:

• Champions included in this table are exclusively those named by an NCAA-designated "major selector" for the given year.
• Teams listed in italics indicate retroactively-applied championships.
• Teams listed in bold reflect the NCAA's designation as "Consensus National Champions" by virtue of their selection from 1950 onward by one or more of the following selectors: Associated Press, United Press/UPI, Football Writers Association of America, National Football Foundation, and USA Today.[23]

A letter next to any season, team, record, coach or selector indicates a footnote that appears at the bottom of the table.

^aParke Davis' selection for 1901, as published in the Spalding's Foot Ball Guide for 1934 and 1935 (to which he contributed until his death), was Harvard.[24]^: 206[25]^: 233 The NCAA Records Book states "Yale" for 1901, which is an error that has been perpetuated since the first appearance of Parke Davis' selections in the NCAA book about 1995.
^bThe NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records book lists Sagarin as having selected Tennessee,[8] while Sagarin's official website gives Ohio State as its 1998 selection.[61]
^cThe FWAA stripped USC of its 2004 Grantland Rice Trophy and vacated the selection of its national champion for 2004. The BCS also vacated USC's participation in the 2005 Orange Bowl and USC's 2004 BCS National Championship, and the AFCA Coaches Poll Coaches' Trophy was returned.[62][63]
^dRecord does not count wins against UCLA, or against Oklahoma in the BCS Championship game on January 4, 2005, as they were vacated by the NCAA.[64]
^eThe NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records book lists Dunkel as having selected LSU,[8] while Dunkel's official website gives USC as its 2007 selection.[37]
^fThe NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records book lists CCR as having selected LSU,[8] while CCR's official website gives USC as its 2003 selection.[33]
^gThe NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records book lists DeVold (DeS) as having selected Florida,[8] while DeVold's official website gives Ohio State as its 2006 selection.[34]
^hThe NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records book lists R(FACT) as having selected Florida,[8] while R(FACT)'s official website gives co-champions Ohio State and Florida as its 2006 selection.[35]
ⁱThe NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records book lists Wolfe as having selected Florida,[8] while Wolfe's official website gives Utah as its 2008 selection.[38]
^j The NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records book lists CCR as having selected Auburn,[8] while CCR's official website gives TCU as its 2010 selection.[39]
^kThe NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records book lists CCR as having selected Alabama,[8] while CCR's official website gives LSU as its 2011 selection.[41]
^mThe NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records book lists Anderson & Hester (A&H) as having selected LSU,[8] while A&H's official website gives Missouri as its 2007 selection.[36]
ⁿThe NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records book lists Anderson & Hester (A&H) as having selected Alabama,[8] while A&H's official website gives LSU as its 2011 selection.[40]
^pKansas' defeat of Missouri was overturned by the Big Eight Conference on December 8 (ineligible player). The reversal erased the only loss on Missouri's record.[65]

The national title count listed below is a culmination of all championship awarded since 1869, regardless of "consensus"[23] or non-consensus status, as listed in the table above according to the selectors deemed to be "major"[6] as listed in the official NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records.[8]

The totals can be said to be disputed. Individual schools may claim national championships not accounted for by the NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records or may not claim national championship selections that do appear in the official NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records (see National championship claims by school below).

The AP college football poll has a long history. The news media began running their own polls of sports writers to determine who was, by popular opinion, the best football team in the country at the end of the season. One of the earliest such polls was the AP College Football Poll, first run in 1934 (compiled and organized by Charles Woodroof, former SEC Assistant Director of Media Relations, but not recognized in the official NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records) and then continuously from 1936. The first major nationwide poll for ranking college football teams, the Associated Press is probably the most well-known and widely circulated among all of history’s polls.[67] Due to the long-standing historical ties between individual college football conferences and high-paying bowl games like the Rose Bowl and Orange Bowl, the NCAA has never held a tournament or championship game to determine the champion of what is now the highest division, NCAA Division I, Football Bowl Subdivision (the Division I, Football Championship Subdivision and lower divisions do hold championship tournaments). As a result, the public and the media began to take the leading vote-getter in the final AP Poll as the national champion for that season.

AP National Championship Trophy

In the AP Poll's early years, the final poll of sportswriters was taken prior to any bowl games and sometimes even prior to the top teams' final games of the regular season.[68][69] In 1938, the poll was extended for one week[68] after Notre Dame, No. 1 in the scheduled "final" poll,[70] subsequently lost to rival USC.[68]

Following the 1947 season the AP held a special post-bowl poll[71] with only two teams on the ballot, Notre Dame and Michigan, but stated that the result would not supersede that of the final poll conducted following the end of the regular season.[71][72] The rivals, both unbeaten and untied, had been ranked No. 1 and No. 2 respectively in the final poll. January voters were impressed by Michigan's 49–0 win over common opponent USC in the Rose Bowl and elevated the Wolverines above the Irish in the special post-bowl poll.[72]

In 1965 the AP decided to delay the season's final poll until after New Year's Day, citing the proliferation of bowl games and the involvement of eight of the poll's current top ten teams in post-season play.[73][74] In the next season, 1966, neither of the top two teams were attending bowl games so no post-bowl poll was taken,[75] even after two-time defending AP national champion No. 3 Alabama won the Sugar Bowl and finished the season unbeaten and untied. In 1967 the final poll crowning USC national champion was taken before No. 2 Tennessee or No. 3 Oklahoma had even played their final games of the regular season,[69] and well before those two teams met in the Orange Bowl.

In 1968 the final poll was again delayed until after the bowl games so that No. 1 Ohio State could meet No. 2 USC in a "dream match" in the Rose Bowl.[76] Every subsequent season's final AP Poll would be released after the bowl games going forward. The UPI did not follow suit with the Coaches Poll until the 1974 season.[77]

Until the 1968 NCAA University Division football season, the final AP Poll of the season was released following the end of the regular season, with the exception of the 1965 season. In 1964, Alabama was named the national champion in the final AP Poll following the completion of the regular season, but lost in the Orange Bowl to Texas, leaving Arkansas as the only undefeated, untied team after the Razorbacks defeated Nebraska in the Cotton Bowl Classic. In 1965, the AP's decision to wait to crown its champion paid off, as top-ranked Michigan State lost to UCLA in the Rose Bowl, number two Arkansas lost to LSU in the Cotton Bowl Classic, and fourth-ranked Alabama defeated third-ranked Nebraska in the Orange Bowl, vaulting the Crimson Tide to the top of the AP's final poll. Michigan State was named national champion in the final United Press International poll of coaches, which did not conduct a post-bowl poll.

The AP Poll was used as a component of the Bowl Championship Series computer ranking formula starting in 1998, but without any formal agreement in place like the contract made between the BCS and the Coaches Poll.[78] For the 2003 season the AP Poll caused a split national title and BCS controversy when it awarded its national championship to No. 1 USC instead of BCS champion LSU.[78] In December 2004 the AP opted out of the BCS formula, requesting that the BCS "discontinue its unauthorized use of the AP poll as a component of BCS rankings", in response to three AP voters from Texas elevating Texas above California into the Rose Bowl in the last regular season AP Poll.[78]

The AFCA National Championship Trophy

News agency United Press (UP), the main competitor to the Associated Press, began conducting its own college football ratings during the 1950 season.[79] The wire service came to be known as United Press International (UPI) following a merger with International News Service in 1958.

The weekly ranking was a joint polling effort between the news agency and the American Football Coaches Association (AFCA), with UP/UPI sports writers gathering and tabulating the coaches' votes and publishing the results in newspapers across the nation.[80]

The UP/UPI rankings were originally conducted by polling 35 of the nation's college football coaches.[79] The coaches were chosen to represent every major football conference, with 5 coaches from each of 7 regions, in an apparent effort to combat the perceived East Coast bias of the rival AP Poll's constituent sports writers.

Their votes will provide the only football rating based on the opinion of the men who know the sport best. The nature of the board, giving each section of the country equal representation, avoids the sectional bias and ballot box stuffing for which other football polls have been criticized.

— United Press Football Ratings announcement, September 1950[79]

Each season's final Coaches Poll was initially published following the regular season and did not take bowl game results into account; the UP/UPI national champion lost its bowl game 8 times between 1950 and 1973. Since the 1974 season the poll has awarded its national championship following the postseason bowls.[81] That same year the AFCA voted to thereafter not rank any team currently under NCAA or conference-sanctioned probation.[81][82]

Following the decline of UPI in the 1980s, the AFCA ended their 42-year relationship with the wire service in 1991.[83][80] The Coaches Poll continued, with new sponsorship and distribution partners, as the USA Today/CNN poll (1991–1996), USA Today/ESPN poll (1997–2004), USA Today poll (2005–2014), and USA Today/Amway poll (2014–present).

The Bowl Championship Series included the Coaches Poll as a major factor in its ranking formula.[84] In return, voting AFCA members were contractually obligated to award their Coaches Poll national championship selections to the winner of the BCS National Championship Game. Lacking its own dedicated trophy, the BCS champion was awarded The Coaches' Trophy on the field immediately following the game.

The following table contains the national championships that have been recognized by the final AP or Coaches Poll. Originally both the AP and Coaches poll champions were crowned after the regular season, but since 1968 and 1974 respectively, both polls crown their champions after the bowl games are completed (with the exception of the 1965 season). The BCS champion was automatically awarded the Coaches Poll championship. Of the current 120+ Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS, formerly Division I-A) schools, only 30 have won at least a share of a national title by the AP or Coaches poll. Of these 30 teams, only 20 teams have won multiple titles. Of the 20 teams, only 7 have won five or more national titles: Alabama, Notre Dame, Oklahoma, USC, Miami (FL), Nebraska, and Ohio State. The years listed in the table below indicate a national championship selection by the AP or Coaches Poll. The selections are noted with (AP) or (Coaches) when a national champion selection differed between the two polls for that particular season, which has occurred in twelve different seasons (including 2004, for which the coaches selection was rescinded) since the polls first came to coexist in 1950.

† USC's 2004 BCS National Championship was vacated by the BCS and the AFCA Coaches Trophy returned.[85]
‡ Retroactively awarded in 2016 by AFCA Blue Ribbon Panel.[19] Oklahoma State was the only school to apply for the award.[20]

The AP Poll and Coaches Poll have picked different final national poll leaders at the end of 11 different seasons since their first concurrent polls in 1950. This situation is referred to as a "split" national championship.[86][87]

Throughout most of the 20th century, bowl game conference tie-ins made it impossible to automatically schedule the two top teams for a single post-season game.[89]

Through luck and fortuitous scheduling, a "national championship game" was occasionally able to settle the matter on the field.[89]

Following back-to-back years of split AP and Coaches Poll national champions in 1990: Colorado (AP), Georgia Tech (Coaches); and 1991: Miami (FL) (AP), Washington (Coaches), the Bowl Coalition was formed in 1992 to increase the probability of a No. 1 vs. No. 2 national championship game matchup in one of the Coalition's participating bowls.[88]

The Coalition's rules retained traditional bowl game conference tie-ins but provided some flexibility for scheduling a No. 1 vs. No. 2 matchup between two teams selected from among the champions of the ACC, Big East, Big Eight, SEC, and SWC conferences, or independent Notre Dame, in the Cotton Bowl, Fiesta Bowl, Orange Bowl, or Sugar Bowl.

The Big Ten and Pac-10 conferences were notably not members of the Bowl Coalition, with their champions retaining their traditional and contractual matchup in the Rose Bowl. Likewise, mid-major teams had no route to the Bowl Coalition National Championship Game.

In 1995 the Bowl Alliance replaced the Bowl Coalition.[133] Going further than the Coalition, the Alliance guaranteed a postseason matchup of the No. 1 and No. 2 ranked teams of its same five conference champions plus Notre Dame. Beginning in 1996, the Big 12 champion joined the Alliance in place of the champions of the disbanded Big Eight and Southwest conferences.

Unlike the Coalition, the Alliance eliminated traditional conference tie-ins to its associated bowls. The Bowl Alliance national championship game would be rotated amongst the Fiesta Bowl, Sugar Bowl, and Orange Bowl, with the Cotton Bowl dropped from the slate. The Bowl Alliance also awarded its own trophy to the winner of its national championship game.[134]

The Rose Bowl remained independent of the Alliance, leaving open the possibility of a national title going to the Big Ten or Pac-10 Rose Bowl champion rather than the Alliance's champion.[135] This occurred in 1997, when No. 1 Michigan won the Rose Bowl and retained their top ranking in the AP Poll.[135] The Bowl Alliance National Championship Game[135] winner Nebraska split the championship when they passed Michigan in the final Coaches Poll (a result denied by the Coaches Poll to Penn State three years earlier in the same situation).

The Bowl Championship Series (BCS), starting in 1998, finally succeeded in bringing the Big Ten and Pac-10 conferences together with the former Coalition and Alliance members for a combined national championship game.

Following the regular season, the BCS paired its No. 1 and No. 2 ranked teams to play for the title in the BCS National Championship Game. This designation initially rotated in order between four BCS Bowls: the Fiesta Bowl, Sugar Bowl, Orange Bowl, and Rose Bowl. For the 2006 season onward the BCS National Championship Game became its own separate contest, played one week later at the site of the bowl in the same rotation.

The BCS formula varied over the years, with the final version relying on a combination of the Coaches and Harris polls and an average of various computer rankings to determine relative team rankings.

The winners of the BCS National Championship Game were crowned the Coaches Poll national champions and were awarded the Coaches' Trophy on the field following the game. They were also awarded the MacArthur Bowl by the National Football Foundation.[14]

† USC's victory in the 2005 Orange Bowl and subsequent 2004–05 BCS National Championship was vacated by the BCS.[138][139]

The College Football Playoff (CFP) was designed as a replacement for the BCS. While the NCAA still does not officially sanction the event, organizers sought to bring a playoff system similar to all other levels of NCAA football to the Football Bowl Subdivision.

The College Football Playoff relies on a 13-member selection committee to choose the top four teams to play in a two-round single-elimination playoff bracket. The winner of the final game is awarded the College Football Playoff National Championship Trophy.

^aUSC's January 4, 2005 win over Oklahoma in the BCS Championship Game was vacated as mandated by the NCAA, its 2004 BCS National Championship vacated by the BCS, and its AFCA Coaches' Trophy returned. NCAA sanctions mandate that "any reference to the vacated results, including championships, shall be removed." USC still retains the 2004 Associated Press National Championship and has not abandoned its claim to a 2004 national championship.[138][231]
^bNo major selectors chose Penn for 1907. Penn's football fact book states that the Billingsley Report named the 1907 team National Champions,[160] but other sources show Billingsley naming Yale for 1907.
^cNo major selectors chose Columbia for 1933. Columbia's media guide states that the team "was referred to as a national champ."[201]
^dGeorgia's website has multiple pages which list national championships by sport and only spells out three seasons for football (1942, 1980, and 2021).[232][189][233] The Georgia football media guide contains a year-by-year results section in which six seasons (1927, 1942, 1946, 1968, 1980, 2021) have "National Champions" headers paired with selector callouts,[190]^{: 169–174} but also a "Championship History" page which places 1942, 1980, and 2021 into a "The Consensus National Champions" section and groups 1927, 1946, and 1968 together as "The other three..." without description as national champions beyond identification of those specific selectors.[190]^: 207 
eAuburn's website notes to five titles that appear in the NCAA Record Book, while not claiming three of them (1913, 1983, and 1993).
^fNo major selectors chose Boston College for 1940.
^gNo major selectors chose Yale for 1901. The original source for Parke Davis' "Outstanding Nationwide and Sectional Teams" states "1901 Harvard".[24][25]
^hNo major selectors chose Pittsburgh for 1934. Parke Davis died in June, 1934; his successor selected Pitt but is not designated as a major selector by the NCAA.

Teams in the following table were selected by notable "minor" national championship selectors not listed in the NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records book. In the interest of brevity, this table contains only teams that were not also selected by any NCAA-designated major selector for the given year.

• Teams listed in italics indicate retroactively-applied championships.