Days ago, Kentucky showed off a new football facility, which includes this trophy for winning the 1950 season’s Sugar Bowl, marqueed with, “The National Champion.”
Kentucky’s 1950 football title claim is funny, but so is Oklahoma’s :) :) :)
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1951 national championship trophy and mannequins showing uniforms greet you in lobby of new training center pic.twitter.com/sSEesoZOz3
— Jon Hale (@JonHale_CJ) July 22, 2016
This image made the rounds Tuesday, and there was much laughter online! Who does UK think it is! Claiming a title that we did not realize it claims! Basketball!
UK’s 2015 media guide says then-coach Bear Bryant “helped the Wildcats claim their first national championship and Southeastern Conference championship in 1950,” and their guides going back at least a decade have similar statements. (Thus, Alabama somehow gets to claim part of yet another title.)
“In the 1990s, research by Jeff Sagarin, who compiles the Sagarin Computer Ratings for USA Today, indicated that UK is the national champion for the 1950 season under that ranking system,” the 2015 guide continues.
UK claims a national title based on something a computer spat out four decades later, and that part’s funny.
However, if college football polls hadn’t been so slow in adjusting to the significance of bowls and title claims, UK would’ve had an argument.
Until 1968, the AP Poll (the public standard for historic title claims) crowned its champion before bowl season and sometimes before even the regular season had finished. The UPI (the eventual USA Today and Coaches Poll) wouldn’t follow suit until 1974, giving us awkward situations like Bama still claiming the ‘73 title despite losing its bowl to the Notre Dame that won the AP.
In 1950, 10-0 Oklahoma was named the national champ by both polls before the Sugar Bowl against No. 7 Kentucky, which UK won.
If that game happened today, we would agree on no championship for OU, because losing your last game means infinitely more than losing a game in the middle of your season, for some commonly accepted reason (source: the 2011 Alabama vs. LSU series).
The Sooners fairly claim the 1950 title to this day, while the team they lost their bowl to gets laughed at for doing the same, all because polls worked differently then.
Still, UK probably wouldn’t have ranked No. 1 in a post-bowl poll. A Wildcat rival would’ve.
Kentucky’s only loss that year was to Tennessee, which entered bowl season at No. 4 and then beat No. 3 Texas. And No. 2 Army lost to Navy after the final poll. So claim it up, Vols.
The Vols do, with far more backing than just the Sagarin system, including the College Football Researchers Association and National Championship Foundation.
Anyway, this happens.
Auburn thought about tacking on three more titles all at once, decades later. Texas A&M will throw any year you want on the side of its stadium under the header NATIONAL CHAMPIONS. Bama’s list of claims inspires year-round Zaprudering.
And not just in the SEC. Among the non-Bama teams to still claim poll titles despite losing their bowl games are 1970 Texas, 1965 Michigan State, 1960 Minnesota, and so on.
Polls are popular, sure, but a poll that discounts the final game of the season is no more legit than a computer system that arrives decades later.
The takeaways, as always, are that this sport is a mess, no one is in charge, you might as well claim whatever you want in order to impress teenagers, and it’s good to laugh.
Elsewhere!
Bill C team of the day: Michigan, which is gonna win a ton of games this year, whether you like it or not.
Let’s talk to the Oregon WR who’s going for gold in Rio, then returning to play football ASAP.
Podcast Ain’t Played Nobody talks about the level of trust earned by Jim Harbaugh, football coach, and the future fate of mid-majordom.
Lovie Smith declared the Illini to be Chicago’s Big Ten team, setting off an annual Illinois-Northwestern debate that consumed the entire days of the 37 humans who care about such a thing.
Maryland and Rutgers might start up a rivalry trophy, seeing as they are Big Ten teams. We have trophy name ideas.
The Big 12 adding BYU would be ok for everybody ... except West Virginia.
Mizzou landed four commits on Tuesday and seven this week.
Feel like every program these days has a “Hard Knocks-style” show coming out. Michigan State, you’re up!
SMU’s being very Dallas about this Big 12 expansion thing, adding prominent notes in press releases on how much money they spend.
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