Ranking Every Power Five College Football Program Since 1980 Starting with the Disturbing

Jake Wimberly

We love to rank college football teams and we love to compare teams in different eras; compare programs as they pertain to decades and more. Who is the best? Is it Alabama of today, or Nebraska of 1995? Who had the better run in college football? Bobby Bowden’s Florida State teams or Pete Carrol’s USC teams?

Today we begin a journey to look at the 66 Power Five Programs and where their “Respective Program” ranks and stacks up against the rest.

We will look over the last forty years (from 1980 to 2020), and based on multiple criteria we will place every team in different tiers.

The tiers are as follows: Super Elite, First Rate, Top Flight, Passable, Strange, Tolerable, Mediocre, Not good enough, Damaged, Weak, Unsettling and Disturbing.

The criteria we will use is multiple, to give each team a final score in our simple program formula. Number of 6 win seasons, 10 win seasons, Conference Titles, Bowl appearances, Bowl wins, National Championship Appearances, National Championships and Losing Seasons.

We will drop individual articles on each tier, marching our way to the top programs of the last forty years.

Today we start at the bottom, and head to the top - we begin with “The Disturbing” of college football.

NOTE: The scores in each column you see do not necessarily represent actual number of winning seasons, titles, etc. these numbers are calculated off a data set for definition purposes only - to come up with a final score.

The Disturbing:

If I was giving you three guesses to pick the lowest rated teams in college football over the last forty years, the name Vanderbilt would come to mind and you would be right. The Commodores playing in the rugged SEC has never been kind to Nashville and may never be. The Dores have only played in seven bowl games since 1980 and Penn State head football coach James Franklin can claim “GLORY” when talking about Vanderbilt football.

Duke is right in front of Vanderbilt - and to nobodies surprise. Tobacco Road has never been football heaven and Duke is only three points away from being Vanderbilt on this scale.

Rutgers played its entire football existence as an independent, then joined the Big East in 1990. The Scarlets do have six bowl wins and a ten win season to show for the last forty years, but they are gonna need a lot more out of a second run from Greg Schiano to move out of this group.

Indiana just had their best football season, probably ever during the pandemic year of 2020, but it’s been tough sledding for the Hoosiers the last 39 years. With only 12, six win seasons prior to 2020, it’s been a blessing to have basketball in Indiana for most of this run.

Another basketball school that’s been about as good in football is Kansas. Kansas does have two conference titles in the last forty years and a couple ten win seasons, but they have been putrid for most of this time. Les Miles was hired to turn the program around and that looks like a lost cause at this point.

Iowa State is a modern day media darling now, but that’s mostly because of Matt Campbell and the last four years. The Cyclones have yet to win a conference title or check this - have a ten win season - in the HISTORY of their program. Some will throw them as a dark horse College Football Playoff Team this year, but they aren’t in that category yet.

Oregon State is last one in, in this group as the Beavers do have a couple conference titles and won a Fiesta Bowl back in 2000. They have seven bowl wins over the last forty years, but they have had very little success since the departure of Mike Riley.

NEXT UP: The Unsettling Group

Editors note: All photos courtesy of 247sports.com