College Football: Schools with the Most Championships All Time

The Figthing Irish Are the Greatest Modern Champions (chicagonow.com)

Believe it or not, Yale has the most college football national championships of all time.  The last one (chuckle) was over 100 years ago – 1909.

The Bulldogs’ Ivy League mates, The Princeton Tigers, are just two crowns behind.  Their last was in 1922.

Now of course there weren’t many teams playing back in the ol’ 1800′s, and the level of competition was surely wanting, but those are the official numbers.

Notre Dame is the first school on the list that has won all of their titles after 1900, followed by Alabama and Michigan.  Those three are more representative of the modern state of the game.

Interesting how in the last two decades or so, you so often hear about teams like the Florida State Seminoles, the Florida Gators, and the current reigning champions, the Auburn Tigers, but relatively, these teams are babes in the long life of college football.

One other very important item to note.  The controversy over who is the national champion is not a modern phenomenon.  This has been going on forever.  In fact, as early as 1880, two champs were crowned (Princeton and Yale).  In the 141 years of declaring a No. 1, at least two schools claimed the title, depending on which sports or news organization you ask, 29 times.

For a look at the year-by-year breakdown of all the college football championships, those years when there were more than one champion – and the organizations that voted for each, check out my source: sports-reference.com