When I was doing research on the 1931 National Championship that Purdue doesn’t claim, I got really curious regarding other unclaimed National Championships for other schools. I enlisted the help of the Committee to go to each team’s Wikipedia page to see if they had some unclaimed national championships on there. It looks like this below.
Purdue Football’s Wikipedia Page showing the Unclaimed National Championships
Now, some of the selectors for national championships are rather weird, but the main point here is there is no one singular governing or official body that regulates, recognizes, or awards national championships in college football, and because many independent selectors of championships exist, many of the claims by the schools listed below are shared, contradict each other, or are controversial.
"There is no official standard because there is no official national champion. It all depends on the standard the school wishes to utilize. The national champion is in the eye of the beholder."
I truly love this sport so much. There isn’t an official standard and no official national champion. It’s fantastic. The school gets to choose if they want to claim a national championship. In the committee's research (special thanks to Beau for the majority of it), we found 33 schools that have unclaimed national championships.
Here is a table of them listed below.
Unclaimed National Titles Graphic
Looking at this you see teams who have National Championships they claim for the most part. The strangest part of these unclaimed national titles, are the schools who don’t have ANY but refuse to claim them for some reason. The majority of these claims, but not all, are based on championships awarded from selectors listed as "major" in the official NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records publication.
For example, Oregon was named the national champion by one selector in 2024. They don’t claim this title, and really for good reason; they lost in the playoff to Ohio State. It’d be weird to claim it right now. Maybe in 2076, they could claim it then? Who knows? Also, Notre Dame was named a champion in 2012. But after getting blown out by Alabama in the BCS Title game, you probably don’t want to claim that one. These national titles all match, like the one for Purdue in 1931, which was a “major selector,” and I wrote about that one here a few weeks ago.
However, not all championships awarded by third-party selectors, nor all those listed in the NCAA records book, are necessarily claimed by each school. The following schools either make no apparent statement or claim regarding national championships or clearly state no claims on a national championship, despite the listing of a national championship for that school in the official NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Records: Arizona State, Colgate, Duke, Missouri, Purdue (we discussed this one), Utah, Vanderbilt, Wazzu, and Washington & Jefferson.
I need to understand why these schools refuse to claim these particular titles and then I will decide whether TO CLAIM IT OR NOT TO CLAIM IT. Now we in the Committee normally say CLAIM IT every time but these aren’t always so clear.
TO CLAIM IT OR NOT TO CLAIM IT… That is the question!
What I am going to do here is to review the seasons of these championships and then provide you with a verdict of CLAIM IT or leave it unclaimed. I’ll briefly touch on each team and season. (Except for Purdue, you got your own post 🙂 )
Let’s start with Vandy! They have SIX UNCLAIMED CHAMPIONSHIPS! SIX!! They don’t have any normal ones. They were given national championships in 1906, 1910, 1911, 1918, 1921, 1922. Why oh why would a school without national championships not claim one??? Time to find out.
1906 Vandy -Finished 8-1, with a 10-4 loss to Michigan, 5-0 in the SIAA, and were conference co-champs. The claimed national champions were Yale at 9-0-1 and Princeton at 9-0-1. Yale and Princeton tied each other this season. Yale only allowed 7 points all season, and Princeton only allowed 9 points. Vandy’s best win was over 8-1 Sewanee. I really can’t yell too hard for this Vandy team. If they beat Michigan, and they go undefeated? I'd say claim it, but they lost.
VERDICT: LEAVE IT UNCLAIMED.
1910 Vandy - Finished 8-0-1, with a 0-0 tie to Yale. 5-0 in the SIAA, and they were conference co-champs. The claimed national champion was Harvard at 9-0-1. Harvard tied Yale 0-0 too. Vandy won their games 165-8, and Harvard won their games 155-5 (with an extra game). That’s the Vaunted Vandy Offense there. Also, Pitt was 9-0 this year too, but their title is unclaimed also.
VERDICT: CLAIM IT VANDY!! Hell, Auburn claims this one and they were 6-1 and co-champs with you in the SIAA at 5-0. CLAIM IT!
1911 Vandy - Finished 8-1, with a 9-8 loss to Michigan on a missed extra point, 5-0 in the SIAA, and conference champs. The national champion was Princeton with an 8-0-2 record; they tied 5-5-1 Lehigh and 6-0-3 Navy. Vandy outscored opponents 259-9. The only points they surrendered all year were against Michigan, which just so happened to be their only game on the road. So do two ties equal one loss?
VERDICT: (not as emphatic) Claim it Vandy. Two ties equal one loss to me. Claim it!
1918 Vandy - Finished 4-2, 2-0 in the SIAA. The two losses were to Camp Greenleaf and Camp Hancock, who fielded teams due to World War I. The two national champions were 5-0 Michigan and 4-1 Pitt.
VERDICT: LEAVE IT UNCLAIMED. The two losses were just too much here.
1921 Vandy - Finished 7-0-1, 5-0-1 in the SIAA, and 4-Way Conference Co-Champs. The tie was 7-7 with another Conference Co-Champ, 7-2-1 Georgia. The wiki for this season opens with The 1921 college football season had no clear-cut champion, with the Official NCAA Division I Football Records Book listing California Golden Bears, Cornell Big Red, Iowa Hawkeyes, Lafayette Leopards, Washington & Jefferson Presidents, and Vanderbilt Commodores as champions. Only California, Cornell, Iowa, and Lafayette claim national championships for the 1921 season. (This year is insane; I will write about it more and more in this post too!)
VERDICT: CLAIM IT VANDY!! COME ON IT’S A CROWDED FIELD!! WHAT IS ANOTHER CLAIMED CHAMPIONSHIP HERE??!!! CLAIM IT!!!
1922 Vandy - Finished 8–0–1 (3–0 SoCon, 2–0 SIAA). Yeah, yeah, that’s right, they were in two different conferences this year. They tied Michigan 0-0. The national champions this year were Cal at 9-0, Cornell at 8-0, and Princeton at 8-0. None of these schools played in two different conferences. Also, the tie was the greatest of achievements for the underdog Commodores and "a great surprise to the sporting world.”
VERDICT - Claim it Vandy. You played in two conferences, you had a great surprise to the sporting world and still went undefeated. CLAIM IT.
VANDY YOU SHOULD HAVE THREE OR FOUR CLAIMED NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS
Time to consider Arizona State and their unclaimed national championships. Their wiki lists two unclaimed national championships in 1970 and 1975. Arizona State is also another school that doesn’t have a national championship claim. Why wouldn’t they claim it? Let’s find out if they should CLAIM IT or NOT.
1970 Arizona State - Finished 11-0 and 7-0 in the WAC. Won the Peach Bowl against 8-3 North Carolina but ended the season ranked 6th by the AP. The claimed national champions this season were Nebraska 11-0-1, Texas 10-1, and Ohio State 9-1. So Arizona State was the only undefeated team in the Top 10. Toledo was 12-0, and Dartmouth was 9-0. Ohio State lost their bowl game, but they still claim this as a title. Texas lost their bowl game, but they still claim this as a title. Nebraska was the only one to win their bowl game. However, they tied 6-4-1 USC in the second week of the season. ASU was picked as the overall #1 team for the 1970 college football season by the Poling System. Poling was a mathematical system used to rank college football teams. It was considered a "National Champion Major Selector" by the National Collegiate Athletic Association. I’ve always said Arizona State and math always go together.
VERDICT: CLAIM IT SUN DEVILS! You won the computers here. Also, two teams who lost their bowl game claim this one, WHY NOT YOU TOO!!
1975 Arizona State - Finished 12–0 and 7–0 in the WAC. Won the Fiesta Bowl over #6 Nebraska 17-14. The national champion was Oklahoma, who finished 11-1 with a loss to 7-5 Kansas, 23-3! Yes, Oklahoma also beat #2 at the time, Nebraska, 35-10. Arizona State finished 2nd in the AP Poll as the only undefeated team in the AP Top 20. This one seems to be poll inertia. Oklahoma started the year at #1, and Arizona State was unranked. Despite the AP and Coaches polls ranking ASU as #2, the Sporting News and The National Championship Foundation (both of which were major selection polls at the time) ranked ASU as the #1 team in the nation.
VERDICT: CLAIM IT AGAIN SUN DEVILS! Undefeated. National Champs. Simple as that.
ARIZONA STATE YOU SHOULD HAVE TWO CLAIMED NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIPS
Up next, we’re going to the Patriot League for Colgate. Their wiki listed the 1932 season as an unclaimed national championship. They don’t claim this national championship for some reason.
1932 Colgate - Finished 9-0 as an independent. The claimed national champions for this year were USC at 10-0, who beat 8-0-2 Pitt in the Rose Bowl 35-0, and Michigan was 8-0 and 6-0 in the Big Ten. Fourth-year head coach Andrew Kerr led Colgate to a perfect record, and the team did not allow an opponent to score throughout the entire season. Nevertheless, Colgate did not receive an expected invitation to the Rose Bowl, and as such, the team was called "undefeated, untied, unscored upon, and uninvited". The 1932 Colgate eleven is one of only three college football teams since 1920 to have finished a perfect season without being scored upon.
VERDICT - CLAIM IT COLGATE!! WHAT THE HELL!! CLAIM IT NOW!! I’M EMAILING YOU NOW TO CLAIM THIS IMMEDIATELY!!
COLGATE YOU SHOULD HAVE ONE CLAIMED NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP
Matter of fact, I am so mad at Colgate, I am ending this post right here. I shall return with Part Two for Duke, Mizzou, Utah, Wazzu and Washington & Jefferson.
Dear Colgate,
How dare you not claim the 1932 national championship…
Oh yeah, they actually responded back and are going to look into conversations about claiming this one and how they would actually go about claiming a national championship…
Lets go Colgate claim it!
