The 1976 college football season saw several new teams step up and reach the four major New Year’s Day bowl games. No team made a bigger splash than Pitt, who produced the Heisman Trophy winner in Tony Dorsett, displaced Penn State as the top team in the East and eventually won the national title.
Pitt got its chance to win the national title in the Sugar Bowl and took advantage in a win over Georgia. No one could call the Bulldogs a new team on the national stage, but they did manage to end Alabama’s five-year run atop the SEC.
Other new teams included Houston, Maryland and Colorado. Houston won the Southwest Conference in their first year of membership, vaulting over traditional powers Texas & Arkansas. Maryland went undefeated and matched up with Houston in the Cotton Bowl. Colorado shared the Big Eight title and got the Orange Bowl bid out of a conference that usually produced Oklahoma or Nebraska.
Only the Rose Bowl went according to form. The Big Ten & Pac-8 races came down to winner-take-all finales between Michigan-Ohio State and USC-UCLA. The Wolverines and Trojans won and each went into New Year’s Day holding out hopes of a national championship if Pitt lost. Ohio State got the consolation prize of the Orange Bowl over UCLA.
You can read about the season-long paths of all eight participants in the major bowl games and how each one unfolded, at the links below.
1976 was a year in college football when traditional powers took a step back and new teams came forward. That’s not unusual today, but it was quite a break from the norm in the world that was 1976. The 1976 Pitt football team was the beneficiary, going undefeated behind an extraordinary season from running back Tony Dorsett.
Oklahoma had won the national championship the previous two seasons, but the Sooners played Texas to a tie in October, then lost consecutive games to Oklahoma State and Colorado, to remove them from both the Big Eight and national pictures.
Two other traditional powers were a little off, those being Notre Dame and Penn State. And it’s against these two schools that Pitt stepped forward and took over the 1976 college football season. Dorsett got his Heisman Trophy run started with a big performance in South Bend on September 11. After Pitt spotted Notre Dame an early touchdown, the Panthers quickly took over and led 21-7 at half. Dorsett had 122 rush yards in the first half alone, and his team coasted home 31-10.
The season ended on Black Friday with a grudge match against Penn State in Three Rivers Stadium, home to the Steelers and Pirates (Pitt’s home games were usually played in an old “bowl” where the top row of the stadium was at ground level). Amidst a steady rain in front of an ABC audience, the Pitt defense intercepted Penn State quarterback Chuck Fusina three times and after being contained in the first half, Dorsett was able to get loosened up after intermission and Pitt completed a perfect season with a 24-7 win.
College football in the East wasn’t highly regarded though—ask Penn State, who had seen unbeaten teams in 1968, 1969 and 1973 not get a chance to play for the national championship. Pitt needed help if the same fate wasn’t going to befall them. In November they got it.
Michigan was ranked #1 in the country and the odds were good that a potential Rose Bowl battle with USC would be for the crown. But the Wolverines suffered a shocking upset loss at Purdue on November 6. The final was 16-14, with Michigan missing a 37-yard-field goal on the game’s final play.
Pitt ascended to #1 and got a bid to the Sugar Bowl to play SEC champ Georgia. The game was in the early time slot on New Year’s Day, so fans would know if the Michigan-USC Rose Bowl game following would have title implications. Maryland was also unbeaten and playing in the Cotton Bowl against Houston, but the Terps would have lacked the political support too leapfrog the Trojans or Wolverines in the event of a Panther loss. In either case, Maryland lost to Houston.
The Pitt-Georgia game was no contest. With the Bulldogs stunting to stop Dorsett, Pitt quarterback Matt Cavanaugh had an efficient game, going 10/18 for 192 yards. And Dorsett still ended up going over 200 yards on the ground when all was said and done. Pitt led 21-0 at half and won the game 27-3. They said goodbye to their coach, Johnny Majors, who was bound for Tennessee, but they had a national title to show for it.
The 1977 Orange Bowl was a consolation prize for the Ohio State Buckeyes, who had gone as high as #2 in the polls during the 1976 college football season, but lost their shot at the national title and then lost the Rose Bowl bid to Michigan. The Buckeyes met the Colorado Buffaloes, a program for whom this prime-time date in Miami was anything but a consolation prize. Let’s look back on the road Ohio State and Colorado took to reach this game.
Woody Hayes had taken Ohio State to four straight Rose Bowls from 1972-75, although the Buckeyes lost three of them, including the most recent to UCLA, which cost Ohio State a national championship. They were still loaded for bear and ranked #4 to open the 1976 season.
The Buckeyes had All-Americans on each side of the ball in offensive tackle Chris Ward and defensive end Bob Brudzinski, and they controlled the tempo of games with a powerful ground attack. Jeff Logan ran for over 1,200 yards to lead the team and powerful fullback Pete Johnson ground out over 700 more. The two quarterbacks, Jim Pacenta and Rod Gerald only threw a combined 94 passes all season long.
Ohio State opened the season by blasting Michigan State 49-21, and some upheaval among other top teams, quickly moved the Buckeyes to #2. The next game was a trip to Penn State, the first one Ohio State would ever make to Happy Valley.
The Buckeyes played opportunistic football against the seventh-ranked Nittany Lions. They forced a pair of turnovers in the red zone, built a 12-0 lead and then hung on after Penn State rallied. Ohio State forced one more turnover with 1:41 left and secured a 12-7 win.
But a letdown did the Buckeyes in back home in Columbus. They faced a Missouri team that was decent, but on their way to a 6-5 season, the Tigers should not have been able to compete with Ohio State. Instead, Hayes’ team suffered a 22-21 loss and skidded back to #8 in the polls. The schedule didn’t get easier with a road trip to fourth-ranked UCLA, but the Buckeyes ground out a 10-10 tie in Los Angeles.
The national championship was gone, with a loss and a tie, and Ohio State took it out on their next six Big Ten opponents. The conference only had one other winning team beyond OSU and Michigan, and that team—Minnesota—was only 6-5. Ohio State had to win a 9-3 battle with the Gophers, and rolled into their traditional season-ending battle with Michigan undefeated in league play and still ranked #8 nationally.
Another bitter home loss awaited. The game was scoreless in the first half when Gerald threw an interception in the end zone just prior to halftime. That was the last time Ohio State seriously threatened to win the game, as Michigan took over the second half and won 22-0. The Buckeyes dropped to #11 and the decision of the Orange Bowl to take them over higher-ranked UCLA was controversial.
The rationale of the Orange Bowl was about business—Ohio State would bring more fans than UCLA, and the bowl committee wanted an Eastern/Rustbelt presence to balance off Colorado. But it has to be said that even on the football merits, Ohio State had played UCLA to a tie on the road and it was reasonable to argue the Buckeyes simply deserved this bid.
Colorado’s path to Miami was quite different. Bill Mallory had taken over a struggling program and gotten a Bluebonnet Bowl invitation in 1974, but there were no signs of the Buffs being ready to challenge Nebraska, and certainly not Oklahoma, who had won the last two national championships. Colorado was unranked to start the 1976 season, and a road loss to what would prove a good Texas Tech team didn’t raise anyone’s expectations.
The Buffs bounced back with a win at Washington and then beat a bad Miami team at home. A rout of Drake sent Colorado into the Big Eight schedule, which they opened with a 24-12 loss to Nebraska.
Colorado bounced back with a 20-10 win at Oklahoma State, moving them into the Top 20 and a 33-14 rout of #16 Iowa State gained the Buffs further credibility. Oklahoma was coming to Boulder on October 30, and while the Sooners weren’t a vintage Barry Switzer powerhouse, they were still ranked #13.
The Buffaloes pulled off a 42-31 upset and the Big Eight race was officially in chaos. Colorado, Nebraska and Oklahoma State were each 3-1 in league play, with Oklahoma and Iowa State both giving chase at 2-2. The Orange Bowl bid, which went automatically to the league champ, was in the grasp of more than half the conference as November opened.
Colorado gave some of their progress back with a 16-7 loss at Missouri—the Tigers, even though their season was disappointing, still managed to beat both entrants in the Orange Bowl in 1976. The Buffs quickly responded with a blowout of Kansas and the conference race was now a four-way tie at the top.
That Mallory had his team still holding a chance at the Orange Bowl bid with one game left was still amazing. He had only one All-American, defensive back Mike Davis. Quarterback Jeff Krapple only completed 44 percent of his passes. The offense relied on 1,200-yard rusher Tony Reed. Now this team needed to just beat Kansas State and get some help.
Colorado upheld their end of the bargain in Manhattan, winning a wild game. They had won a share of the league crown, as had Oklahoma State. One more team was poised to claim a piece of what would be a tri-championship, and it was going to be the winner of the Nebraska-Oklahoma game, played six days later on Black Friday.
The Buffs needed the Sooners to win—since Colorado had beaten both Oklahoma and Oklahoma State, they would win the tiebreakers for the Orange Bowl nod. A Nebraska win, and the higher-ranked Cornhuskers would likely go to Miami. OU did its part to help the Cinderella story with a win, and the Buffs were going to South Beach.
Colorado looked like they might continue this magical ride a little longer when they jumped on top of Ohio State early in the Orange Bowl. The Buffs got an early field goal and they converted a big 4th-and-2 on the Buckeye 11 for a touchdown and a 10-0 lead. And they would win the turnover battle 4-2.
But in spite of falling behind, losing the turnover battle and having a completely inept passing game, the Ohio State running game was just too good. Logan bolted 36 yards up the middle for one touchdown and a field goal tied it up in the second quarter. Before halftime, Ohio State went on a 99-yard touchdown march that was capped off with a Johnson TD run. It was 17-10 at half, and the Buckeyes continued to control the second half, winning 27-10.
Mallory would go on to more success as a head coach, here, at Northern Illinois and at Indiana, but he never again reached a major bowl game. More surprising is that this game is the last big bowl Woody ever won. His team lost the Sugar Bowl the next year at Alabama, and one year later was the infamous Gator Bowl defeat where he punched an opposinag player and got fired. Had this been known at the time, the 1977 Orange Bowl win would have been more than just a light ending to a day when the national champion had already been crowned much earlier.
Upstarts crashed the 1977 Cotton Bowl. The Houston Cougars were in the first year of the old Southwest Conference, which had the bowl’s automatic bid. Rather than pay deference to legendary coaches in Texas’ Darrell Royal and Arkansas’ Frank Broyles, both in their final year, Houston quickly won the league. Their opponent was Maryland, who rose up to enjoy an undefeated season. Here’s how they arrived in Dallas following the 1976 college football season.
Bill Yeoman had taken over the Houston program in 1962, and after nine straight winning seasons, the Cougars fell to 2-8 in 1975. Nothing suggested a turnaround was in the offing. They were unranked to start the year. An opening day road win over what would prove to be a pretty good Baylor team was promising, but the Cougars promptly lost 49-14 at Florida on September 18.
September 25 was what gave Houston fans real hope that this year would be different. They hosted ninth-ranked Texas A&M. The Aggies had a terrific running back in George Woodward, who would average 144 yards-per-game this season. Houston shut him down.
The Cougar defensive front was led by Wilson Whitley, who won the Lombardi Award and would go #8 overall in the coming spring’s NFL draft. Houston won the game 21-10, then blew out West Texas A&M two weeks later to move into the Top 20.
Houston thumped SMU, but then dropped a tough 14-7 decision at home to Broyles and Arkansas. The loss sent the Cougars back out of the polls. They began another climb and this time they didn’t stop.
The Cougar running game was led by Alois Blackwell, who rushed 934 yards and they had a ballhawking defensive back in Anthony Francis, who intercepted ten passes. Houston blasted winless TCU to move into the polls and then opened everyone’s eyes when they went into Austin and shut out Texas 30-0. It’s true that was not a vintage Longhorn team for Royals’ final year—they went 5-5-1—but beating Texas in any era is significant and certainly a road shutout in the mid-1970s.
It set up Houston’s biggest game, at unbeaten and fifth-ranked Texas Tech on November 20. The winner would hold the inside track to the Cotton Bowl. Cougar quarterback Danny Davis was often erratic—even by the standards of the era, his 47.8% completion rate was low, but he led an offense that put up 27 points in Lubbock. Houston led 27-19 late in the game and an interception killed a final Red Raider drive.
The victory moved Houston to #7 in the polls and they took care of three-win Rice a week later to sew up the Cotton Bowl spot. A non-conference home win over Miami, 21-16, had the Cougars ranked #6 when New Year’s Day arrived.
Maryland was a program that head coach Jerry Claiborne had moving up, with a 25-10-1 record in the coach’s first three years in College Park. All three years had resulted in bowl appearances, but the Terps had yet to play on the New Year’s stage. They opened the 1976 season ranked #12.
The Terrapins opened with seven games that were relatively easy. Villanova, then playing Division I football, was the only one of the seven to finish with a winning record, and Maryland won all seven games. They elevated from #12 to #5 in the process.
Maryland, like Houston, was led by a great defensive tackle. Joe Campbell was an All-American and would be chosen one spot ahead of Whitley in the coming NFL draft. The Terps also had two excellent guards in Ed Fulton and Tom Shick, and tackle Dave Conrad rounded out a very good offensive line. The line cleared the way for fullback Tim Wilson, running back Alvin Maddox, and running quarterback Mark Manges.
The biggest game of the year wasn’t an ACC opponent—it was a home date with Kentucky, the place Claiborne had gone to school and would eventually return to coach in 1982. The Wildcats would finish the season 7-4, and had beaten ranked teams in Penn State and LSU. Kentucky came to College Park on October 30 and Maryland answered the bell with a 24-14 win.
Claiborne’s team followed that up with a win over eight-win Cincinnati, and then shut out Clemson and Virginia. It put a lock on not just an ACC title and not just a Cotton Bowl bid, but an undefeated season.
Maryland was ranked #4, but had no real chance at the national championship. Another undefeated upstart out of the East, the Pitt Panthers, were ranked #1 and in the Sugar Bowl. If Pitt lost, the polls would surely crown the winner of Michigan-USC in the Rose Bowl, the two teams immediately behind Pitt in the rankings. Neither were undefeated, but the Terps simply lacked the respect and the weakness of the ACC at this time didn’t help.
There might not have been a national title to settle in Dallas, but the winner of this game would end up in the Top 5 of the final polls, a much better neighborhood than either team was accustomed to.
The weather was ice cold in Dallas, and it was Houston who came out and struck very quickly. After a touchdown drive, the Cougars blocked a punt to set up another quick score. Then they recovered a fumble and scored again. It was 21-0 and all three touchdowns had come within a 5 ½ minute span.
But Maryland stormed back. Manges ran for a touchdown in the second quarter. Houston answered that one, but missed the extra point. In the third quarter, Manges both ran and threw for a touchdown and now it was 27-21. Houston was backed up on their own goal line in the fourth quarter facing third and long. Davis made one of the biggest throws of the season, converting the first down. Later in the drive, on 4th-and-1, Yeoman went for it, and it kept a drive for a clinching field goal alive.
Houston won 30-21, keyed by Blackwell going for two touchdowns and over 160 yards against a defense that hadn’t allowed a rushing touchdown for 22 quarters coming into the game. The Cougars got into the Top 5, finishing fourth in the final poll.
USC and Michigan both had national title hopes in 1976 and they brought those hopes into their matchup at the 1977 Rose Bowl. Even though circumstances didn’t work out for either team to end up playing for the title, the Trojans and Wolverines still staged a great battle for #2.
The Trojans were coming off an 8-4 season, something that was a disappointment for them at a time when head coach John McKay had won national championships in 1967 and 1972 and finished #2 in 1974. McKay went on to the NFL to coach the expansion Tampa Bay Buccaneers and John Robinson took over for the new season.
USC was still ranked eighth in the preseason polls and they were loaded with talent. Ricky Bell ran for over 1,400 yards and finished second in the Heisman Trophy voting. There were two good receivers in Shelton Diggs and Tandy Simmrin and a future NFL starter in Vince Evans at quarterback. All-American offensive lineman Marvin Powell anchored the trenches.
On the defensive side, tackle Gary Jeter and corner Dennis Thurman—both future pros—got All-American notice. It made a season-opening loss at home to Missouri, by a 46-25 count, all the more shocking and counted as a rocky start to Robinson’s tenure.
USC turned it around though, and began blowing through opponents in what was then the Pac-8 conference (Arizona & Arizona State were not yet members, nor were more recent additions in Utah and Colorado). The Trojans won eight games in a row, rose to third in the nation and had big games with UCLA and Notre Dame ahead that would define their season.
Michigan had gone 38-3-3 the previous four regular seasons but never reached the Rose Bowl. The Big Ten did not allow runner-ups to go to bowls prior to 1975, so the previous year’s Orange Bowl—a loss to national champion Oklahoma—was the only postseason appearance for head coach Bo Schembecler over since 1971. The Wolverines opened the season ranked #2 in the nation and had a plethora of talent themselves.
Rob Lytle rushed for over 1,400 yards himself and led the Big Ten in carries, yards and yards-per-attempt. Both guards on the offensive line, Mark Donahue and Bill Dufek, were All-Americans. Jim Smith got similar mention for both his receiving and return skills. Linebacker Calvin O’Neal anchored the defense.
The Big Ten was known as “The Big Two” and “Little Eight” in those days, recognizing that Michigan and Ohio State were the only programs capable of serious contention. Minnesota, who finished 6-5, was the only other team to even finish over .500 overall. Michigan hadn’t yet started its season-opening series with Notre Dame, so there was no one to challenge them as they blew their first eight games.
There shouldn’t have been any problems at Purdue on November 6. Michigan had moved to the top of the polls in the first week after Nebraska played to a tie, and there was no reason to think the Wolverines wouldn’t be undefeated when they played Ohio State. But in West Lafayette, the UM defense gave up 162 yards rushing to future NFL running back Scott Dierking, trailed 16-14 and then missed a 37-yard field goal as time expired.
On November 20, Michigan was #4 in the country and USC was #3. The two teams were playing their traditional rivals, Ohio State and UCLA in winner-take-all games that served as de facto semi-finals for the Rose Bowl. UCLA was ranked #2. The winners would go to Pasadena and hope that top-ranked Pitt would either lose the following week to Penn State or in the Sugar Bowl.
The Trojans and Wolverines both dominated. In the Midwest, the game was scoreless at half and Michigan had to turn back an Ohio State drive with an end-zone interception. That was the only time the Buckeyes got near the end zone all day. Lytle rushed for 165 yards and Michigan eventually broke it open for a 22-0 win. Out west, Bell played on a sprained ankle and ran for 167 yards. USC led 24-0 before UCLA scored two meaningless touchdowns to make the final score look respectable.
USC and Michigan came to Pasadena in the 2-3 spots in the polls after Pitt was able to beat Penn State. The Sugar Bowl was played in the early afternoon on New Year’s 1977, so everyone at the Rose Bowl would know by kickoff if this game was for a national title.
No such luck. Pitt routed Georgia, but the pride of the Rose Bowl rivalry was more than enough for both schools. Particularly with Schembecler having never won a Rose Bowl and Robinson coaching in his first.
The game went Michigan’s way early. Bell was knocked out on the second play of the game, and Lytle scored on a short rushing touchdown. The extra point was blocked and that seemed to mark the shift of momentum over to USC.
Charles White was #2 on the USC depth chart at tailback and at ran for over 850 yards himself. The freshman would win the Heisman Trophy his senior year. Today was his breakout game, as he went for 114 in Bell’s absence. Evans threw for 181 yards, including a fourth-and-goal sprintout just before halftime that gave USC the lead.
With three minutes left, White scored a touchdown that basically clinched a tie for USC in the era prior to overtime. Michigan got a pair of long completions from quarterback Rick Leach to get into USC territory and Leach then picked up six yards on a keeper. But on 2nd-and-4, Leach threw three straight incompletions. Ballgame, and USC was #2.
It wasn’t the last time Robinson would win in Pasadena and it wasn’t the last time Schembecler would face frustration. But in the modern era of 1976 and beyond, this battle for #2 was the biggest Rose Bowl game these two proud schools would play against each other.
The 1977 Sugar Bowl settled a national championship in front of the president of the United States, as Jimmy Carter attended to watch his home-state Georgia Bulldogs. President Carter didn’t get to see his home state team win, but he did watch an impressive display for the Pitt Panthers, who capped off a perfect season with a championship win.
Pitt opened the year ranked #9 in the country, after coming off a strong 1975 campaign. The Panthers were giving signs of being ready to displace Penn State as the best team out of the East. Pitt had won a big season-opening game against these same Georgia Bulldogs—in Athens no less—and later beat Notre Dame. Pitt showcase a talented running back in Tony Dorsett and were on the rise.
Georgia didn’t have quite the same expectations. Even though they were ranked #16 in the preseason poll, the Bulldogs were coming off getting blown out by Arkansas in the previous year’s Cotton Bowl and the SEC was mostly the exclusive property of Alabama and Bear Bryant.
Pitt wasted little time in showing what they could do. They traveled to South Bend to play a revenge-minded Notre Dame team, but the Panthers demonstrated their superiority. Dorsett ran for 122 yards in the first half alone, kicking off a year in which he would clear 2,100 yards and win the Heisman Trophy. Pitt won easily 31-10 and on an opening week marked by upsets within the Top 10, they quickly moved up to #3.
The Panthers had a ballhawking secondary, with defensive backs Bob Jury, Jeff Delaney and Leroy Felder combining for 23 interceptions. Al Romano was a nose tackle who got All-American mention, and Matt Cavanaugh was quietly efficient at quarterback, making plays when he needed to and otherwise letting Dorsett and the defense.
Pitt tore through its next nine games, never challenged and got set to play Penn State on Black Friday.
Georgia had, even by the standards of 1976, a run-heavy offense, led by quarterback Ray Goff. The man who one day would be the Bulldog head coach, was the SEC Player of the Year in 1976 thanks to his running ability. He ran for 724 yards, and Kevin McLee was the top back, with over 1,000 yards. Mike Wilson and Joel Parrish, a pair of All-American offensive lineman, paved the way for the powerful ground attack.
The Dawgs opened the season at home with Cal, who was ranked #15, but proved to be overrated. Georgia quickly exposed that with an easy 36-24 win. After taking care of rivals Clemson and South Carolina, the Bulldogs were up to #6 in the country. Now Alabama was coming to town.
Big games between Georgia and Alabama have been rare over the years, with the 2012 SEC Championship Game being the rare exception. 1976 was another execption and the Bulldog defense delivered. The held the Tide to 86 yards on the ground and won 21-0.
A letdown followed at Ole Miss, a 21-17 loss and it took wins over Vanderbilt, Kentucky and 20th-ranked Cincinnati to get back into the Top 10. Another big rivalry game awaited, the battle with Florida at neutral-site Jacksonville.
Florida was not the perennial football power that it became in the 1990s, but their 1976 team was one of the best the school had seen to that time. They were undefeated in league play, ranked 10th in the country and the winner of this game had the inside track to the SEC championship and the automatic bid to the Sugar Bowl.
The Georgia defense couldn’t keep up early in the game and gave up 27 points in the first half, trailing by two touchdowns. Goff quickly got his team back in the game with a touchdown pass and then the defense, aided by some questionable Florida game management, stepped up.
It was 4th-and-1 for Florida on their own 29-yard line and head coach Doug Dickey opted to go for it. “Fourth And Dumb” is how the play lives in Gator infamy. The Dawgs made the stop, scored the touchdown and the momentum irrevocably shifted. Georgia won 41-27. Then they beat Auburn 28-0 to close out their conference championship, Sugar Bowl bid and were #5 in the nation.
Pitt matched up with Penn State in a game played at old Three Rivers Stadium in the Steel City. The Panthers had moved up to #2 in the country in early October when Ohio State lost, and then took the #1 spot in the polls in early November when Michigan lost. Pitt had what its traditional rival in Penn State never had in their own undefeated/uncrowned seasons of 1968, 1969 and 1973—a chance to control their national championship destiny.
On a rainy day, Pittsburgh intercepted three Chuck Fusina passes, Dorsett ran well in the second half and the Panthers won 24-7. They had already accepted the Sugar Bowl nod in any event, but now they would go to New Orleans ranked #1.
Georgia had no realistic path to win the national championship. The Rose Bowlfeatured the #2 and #3 teams in USC-Michigan. If the Dawgs won the Sugar Bowl, which was played in the early afternoon time slot, it would turn the mid-afternoon Rose into a national championship game.
When the game started, the Bulldogs sold out to stop Dorsett, stacking the box with as many as nine players. Cavanaugh showed what he could do if necessary, throwing for 192 yards—a lot, by the standards of the era. And Dorsett? Well, he still rushed for over 200 yards. Pitt coasted to a 27-3 win that sealed a national championship.
Pitt got its chance to win the national title in the Sugar Bowl and took advantage in a win over Georgia. No one could call the Bulldogs a new team on the national stage, but they did manage to end Alabama’s five-year run atop the SEC.