The 1977 college football season was one in which the top five teams all finished with records of 11-1-0. Notre Dame, which beat a #1 ranked Texas team in the Cotton Bowl Classic, became the national champion. The year 1977 was the last before NCAA's Division I was divided into I-A and I-AA. On the eve of a national playoff for the smaller programs that would be I-AA, the Sugar Bowl in 1977 became the fourth bowl game to sign a contract guaranteeing an appearance by a major conference champion. The result was that meetings between the media poll choices for the top two teams were less likely, unless those teams were in the Big Ten and Pac-8 (which met in the Rose Bowl), or one of the teams was not obligated to play in a particular bowl game.
Besides the Big 10-Pac-8 matchup in the Rose Bowl, the SWC champion played in the Cotton Bowl Classic, the Big 8 titlist in the Orange Bowl, and the SEC champ in the Sugar Bowl. Top teams that had their choice of which bowl to play were either in a conference outside of the five major powers (such as the ACC or the WAC) or those that were "independent" (not affiliated with any conference), During the 20th Century, the NCAA had no playoff for the college football teams that would later be described as "Division I-A". The NCAA Football Guide, however, did note an "unofficial national champion" based on the top ranked teams in the "wire service" (AP and UPI) polls. The "writers' poll" by Associated Press (AP) was the most popular, followed by the "coaches' poll" by United Press International) (UPI). The AP poll consisted of the votes of as many as 64 writers, though not all voted in each poll, and the UPI poll was taken of a 42 member board of coaches.
Read more about 1977 College Football Season: September, October, November, Rule Changes, Conference Standings, #1 and #2 Progress, Bowl Games, Other Champions, Heisman Trophy
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“[B]y going to the College [William and Mary] I shall get a more universal Acquaintance, which may hereafter be serviceable to me; and I suppose I can pursue my Studies in the Greek and Latin as well there as here, and likewise learn something of the Mathematics.”
—Thomas Jefferson (1743–1826)
“People stress the violence. That’s the smallest part of it. Football is brutal only from a distance. In the middle of it there’s a calm, a tranquility. The players accept pain. There’s a sense of order even at the end of a running play with bodies stewn everywhere. When the systems interlock, there’s a satisfaction to the game that can’t be duplicated. There’s a harmony.”
—Don Delillo (b. 1926)
“Let us have a good many maples and hickories and scarlet oaks, then, I say. Blaze away! Shall that dirty roll of bunting in the gun-house be all the colors a village can display? A village is not complete, unless it have these trees to mark the season in it. They are important, like the town clock. A village that has them not will not be found to work well. It has a screw loose, an essential part is wanting.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)