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Message: [QUOTE="SWC75, post: 4272835, member: 289"] 1976 [URL unfurl="true"]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1976_NCAA_Division_I_football_rankings[/URL] [URL unfurl="true"]http://www.tiptop25.com/fixing1976.html[/URL] After Jock Sutherland left Pittsburgh in a huff in 1937 over the university’s failure to pay for a celebratory party for his team’s Rose Bowl, the administration there deemphasized the sport, refusing to pay for athletic scholarships. The program had losing records from 1940-47, losing to national champion Michigan in that latter year by 0-69. The school decided to get serious again because they wanted to join the Big Ten, which became the Big 9 when Chicago gave up the sport. They lost that bid to Michigan State and were up and down for a few years until they hired John Michelosen, who had quarterbacked Sutherland’s 1936-37 teams and for several years they had a respected program, with winning records in 1955-56, 1958-60, and 1963, when they went 9-1 with a #4 national ranking in the writer’s poll, #3 in the coach’s poll (their only loss being to Roger Staubach’s #2 ranked Navy team, 12-24). They got qypped out of a bowl because bids were lined up well before the regular season ended and the bowl committee didn’t think Pitt would win out but they did. But the program was headed downhill again. Michelosen was only able to win 6 games in his last two season and they began losing by disturbing margins, a combined 26-148 to Syracuse, Notre Dame and Southern California in consecutive weeks. Michelosen was fired and replaced by Dave Hart, who proved to be their version of G-Rob, going 1-9 for three consecutive years. When Notre Dame rolled to a 49-0 halftime lead in a 1968 game, Hart went over to Ara Parseghian and asked him to hold down the score in the second half. That was leaked to the public and he was fired shortly afterwards. Pitt did a coaching search no one affiliated with a big-time school wanted the job, so they settle don Carl DePasqua, who had coached Waynesburg to an NAIA championship in 1966 and followed that up with a team that averaged 54 points a game, (but lost, amazingly, in a shut-out). DePasqua did better than Hart but never had a winning record at Pitt, finishing 13-29, including 1-10 in his final year, 1972. The university had been experiencing financial problems and hired Wesley Posvar to be their new Chancellor in 1967. Pittsburgh became a ‘state-related’ University after years strictly as a private school, resulting in a huge influx of funds. He came to the conclusion that a successful football program was necessary for the financial health of the school and hired for Tennessee All-American Johnny majors to be Pitt’s new coach in 1973. At that time there were no scholarship limitations and Majors gave out no less than 73 of them that first year. Pitt is in the center an excellent recruiting area, (western Pennsylvania and Ohio) and for the first time in decades, took full advantage of it. The freshmen of 1973 won the national championship in 1976. One of them was Tony Dorsett, one of the greatest running backs of all time. Tony and his mates went 6-5-1, 7-4, 8-4 and then capped it off with 12-0-0, (381-133). Early in their junior years they lost to Oklahoma’s national champions in Norman, 10-46. Dorsett was morose watching Joe Washington run for touchdowns. Majors came over to him and told him his time was coming. In 1976, it did. There were other strong teams that year, but they were unable to run the table. Michigan looked like the team of the year, roaring through their first 8 games by 352-58. But then the school that ahs pulled off more big upsets than any in history, Purdue, struck again, taking down the Wolverines 16-14. Southern California lost their opener to another pesky program, Missouri, 25-46, then ran the table, including a 24-14 win over a 9-0-1 UCLA team. Georgia got tripped up in week #5 by Mississippi 17-21 but won the rest. Two other Eastern teams, Maryland and upstart Rutgers, matched Pitt’s 11-0 record. The last regular season poll had the Panthers #1, Michigan, who rallied to beat Illinois and then Ohio State by 22-0, #2, the Trojans #3, then Maryland #4, then Georgia #5. Rutgers at #17 was not taken seriously. They weren’t even invited to a bowl game. Michigan and USC were contracted to play each other in the Rose Bowl and I remember Johnny Robinson, the Trojan coach, telling everyone who would listen that their game was “the real battle for the national championship”. No eastern team had been voted #1 since Syracuse in 1959. Pitt was matched with Georgia in the Sugar Bowl. Maryland went to the Cotton Bowl to play a 9-2 Houston team, (the Cougars were by now and SWC team). Houston jumped out to a 21-0 first quarter lead and coasted, 30-21. The Trojans struggled to a relatively dull 14-6 win over the Wolverines in Pasadena while the Panthers put on a dazzling show in blowing out the Bulldogs, 27-3. In the AP poll they went from having 45 first place votes to having 59 first place votes. There wouldn’t have been a need for another game. Cotton Bowl: No gots Rose Bowl: [MEDIA=youtube]CML3NoJJwt8[/MEDIA] Sugar Bowl: [URL="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L7uGSugzLYM"]1977 Sugar Bowl Pittsburgh vs Georgia No Huddle[/URL] [/QUOTE]

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