Tech's 1952 National Championship season

Sideways

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Supersizethatorder-mutt said:
I just discovered a couple of videos regarding the 1952 NC season. The first has interviews and a few highlights. The second is a lot longer with lots more info.



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Six, count em, six All Americans on that team. Yes, I would say they were a legit national championship team. They beat a nationally ranked Duke team pretty convincingly and stomped a pretty decent Alabama team. Ole Miss was nationally ranked when we played them in the Sugar Bowl.
 
MikeJackets1967

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Sideways said:
Six, count em, six All Americans on that team. Yes, I would say they were a legit national championship team. They beat a nationally ranked Duke team pretty convincingly and stomped a pretty decent Alabama team. Ole Miss was nationally ranked when we played them in the Sugar Bowl.
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8-0-2 Ole Miss was ranked number 6 going into the Sugar Bowl matchup with Georgia Tech
 
Supersizethatorder-mutt

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And yet somehow Mich State, who only played 9 games and didn't even play in a bowl game was awarded the AP National Championship. That's just inconceivable.
Michigan State was an almost unanimous choice, which is odd, because Georgia Tech defeated more rated opponents (in the AP and coaches' polls), and MSU had a razor-close win over Oregon State, while no unrated team came within a touchdown of Georgia Tech.
 
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MikeJackets1967

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Supersizethatorder-mutt said:
And yet somehow Mich State, who only played 9 games and didn't even play in a bowl game was awarded the AP National Championship. That's just inconceivable.
Michigan State was an almost unanimous choice, which is odd, because Georgia Tech defeated more rated opponents (in the AP and coaches' polls), and MSU had a razor-close win over Oregon State, while no unrated team came within a touchdown of Georgia Tech.
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The same thing happened to 9-0 UCLA in 1954. They couldn't go to a Bowl Game because they went to the Rose Bowl in 1953 and were awarded to National Championship courtesy of the Coaches Poll. Michigan State couldn't go Bowling because they weren't a full member of the Big 10 until 1953.
 
Supersizethatorder-mutt

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MikeJackets1967 said:
The same thing happened to 9-0 UCLA in 1954. They couldn't go to a Bowl Game because they went to the Rose Bowl in 1953 and were awarded to National Championship courtesy of the Coaches Poll. Michigan State couldn't go Bowling because they weren't a full member of the Big 10 until 1953.
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Just shows how full of crap the rating services were.
 
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Supersizethatorder-mutt said:
Just shows how full of crap the rating services were.
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One of the teams the 1954 UCLA team beat was the San Diego Naval Training Center:rolleyes:

1954 UCLA

San Diego NTC W 67-0
Kansas W 32-7
Maryland W 12-7
Washington W 21-20
Stanford W 72-0
Oregon State W 61-0
California W 27-6
Oregon W 41-0
USC W 34-0 USC lost to the other National Champion Ohio State in the Rose Bowl
 

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MikeJackets1967 said:
Yeah,it is;)Pepper had a pretty good number of snaps at QB in GT's 24-7 win over Ole Miss in the 1953 Sugar Bowl. I think he was the greatest quick kicker GT ever had.
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Rodgers for many years held several Sugar Bowl passing records. Might still. But just in January he was one of 18 players/coaches named to the first Sugar Bowl Football Hall of Fame. Betcha his head just about exploded, and he always did have trouble finding hats that fit.
 
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Skeptic said:
Rodgers for many years held several Sugar Bowl passing records. Might still. But just in January he was one of 18 players/coaches named to the first Sugar Bowl Football Hall of Fame. Betcha his head just about exploded, and he always did have trouble finding hats that fit.
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The Sugar Bowl against West Virginia was so one sided that the head of the Sugar Bowl committee apologized to Bobby Dodd for inviting West Virginia.
 

Sideways

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MikeJackets1967 said:
8-0-2 Ole Miss was ranked number 6 going into the Sugar Bowl matchup with Georgia Tech
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I did not know they were ranked that high. I know Johnny Vaught just hated Georgia Tech because we would not play them because of money according to Dodd. Any team with Jimmy "King" Lear on it was bound to be pretty good.
 

FightWinDrink

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Supersizethatorder-mutt said:
Just shows how full of crap the rating services were.
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I imagine there were plenty of voters back then that barely watched any games due to accessibility. I also believe that most of the AP was concentrated in the northeast and Midwest at the time so voting was definitely biased in those regions. May have still been a little early for this one but I know as things got closer to 64 it became political for some voters to refuse the vote for any still segregated southern schools. Could have come into play
 
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FightWinDrink said:
I imagine there were plenty of voters back then that barely watched any games due to accessibility. I also believe that most of the AP was concentrated in the northeast and Midwest at the time so voting was definitely biased in those regions. May have still been a little early for this one but I know as things got closer to 64 it became political for some voters to refuse the vote for any still segregated southern schools. Could have come into play
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I think that may have had a lot to do with what happened in 1960 when 10-0-1 Ole Miss won the National Championship in one poll and 8-1 Minnesota won the National Championship in the other poll. There were no post Bowl Game polls back then. Ole Miss beat 7-3 Rice 17-13 in the Sugar Bowl while Minnesota lost 17-7 to 9-1 Washington in the Rose Bowl.
 
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