Top Winning %s NCAA Football Last 30, 20, 10 Years
There were some interesting comments in the "best coaching jobs" thread - specially for how Oklahoma is not an elite job - that had me scratching my head. Considering the Switzer to Stoops era was conceptually one of the best off the top of my head I could think of (i.e. top 5) for 40ish year I am not sure where this viewpoint was coming from. At first I thought maybe younger guys dont remember how dominant Oklahoma used to be, but considering Stoops has the same winning % as Bo did ....in an era with scholarship reductions and far more parity, that didn't make sense. Maybe an 80% win % is just not that impressive to some. Switzer was even more dominant (albeit with some wink wink stuff going on). Anyhow I digress a bit but how someone doesn't think OK is one of the top 7-8 jobs in the country is beyond me. It's not an academic ranking - its damn football, and Oklahoma is and has been a bad ass program for decades.
Anyhow that thread led me to take a look back at the top program winning %s by in 3 time frames. While the headline says 30, 20 and 10 years it's technically 31, 21, and 11 years (1984, 1994 and 2004 to 2014). I tried to focus on P5 conferences but did add in TCU and Utah which spent most of this time outside the P5 - I also included Louisville which was in various conferences. Former Big East conference members were difficult to figure out since things changed so often there but this should cover the major players. So you have your Louisvilles, West VAs, VA Techs etc. I did include BYU over 30 years but excluded them in the 10 and 20 due to error.
This data also doesnt penalize for sanctions.
Some interesting data:
1984-2014 (31 years)
| Team | % | |
| 1 | FSU | 77.95% |
| 2 | Nebraska | 76.21% |
| 3 | OSU | 75.93% |
| 4 | Miami | 74.21% |
| 5 | UF | 73.51% |
| 6 | OK | 73.06% |
| 7 | UM | 70.10% |
| 8 | Auburn | 69.16% |
| 9 | PSU | 69.10% |
| 10 | GA | 68.75% |
| 11 | TN | 68.23% |
| 12 | BYU | 67.93% |
| 13 | Bama | 67.80% |
| 14 | USC | 67.61% |
| 15 | TX | 67.41% |
| 16 | LSU | 67.11% |
| 17 | Va Tech | 66.97% |
| 18 | Oregon | 66.76% |
| 19 | A&M | 65.97% |
| 20 | ND | 65.70% |
| 21 | Clemson | 65.40% |
| 22 | WVA | 62.40% |
| 23 | Utah | 61.34% |
| 24 | TCU | 60.08% |
| 25 | UCLA | 59.97% |
| 26 | Wiscy | 59.92% |
| 27 | Iowa | 59.74% |
| 28 | GA Tech | 58.05% |
| 29 | WA | 58.00% |
| 30 | Ark | 57.85% |
1994-2014 (21 years)
| Team | % | |
| 1 | OSU | 79.38% |
| 2 | FSU | 75.87% |
| 3 | UF | 74.54% |
| 4 | Neb | 73.90% |
| 5 | Oregon | 73.59% |
| 6 | VA Tech | 73.33% |
| 7 | Texas | 72.58% |
| 8 | Oklahoma | 71.12% |
| 9 | LSU | 71.11% |
| 10 | GA | 70.87% |
| 11 | USC | 70.12% |
| 12 | Wiscy | 69.07% |
| 13 | Miami | 68.34% |
| 14 | TCU | 68.09% |
| 15 | Bama | 67.89% |
| 16 | KSU | 67.30% |
| 17 | UM | 67.18% |
| 18 | Auburn | 67.11% |
| 19 | PSU | 67.05% |
| 20 | Utah | 66.93% |
| 21 | TN | 65.78% |
| 22 | Louisville | 63.04% |
| 23 | WVA | 62.31% |
| 24 | Clemson | 62.21% |
| 25 | ND | 61.58% |
| 26 | A&M | 61.49% |
| 27 | Texas Tech | 60.92% |
| 28 | GA Tech | 59.25% |
| 29 | Iowa | 57.17% |
| 30 | MSU | 57.12% |
2004-2014 (11 years)
| Team | % | |
| 1 | OSU | 80.92% |
| 2 | LSU | 77.78% |
| 3 | Oregon | 77.62% |
| 4 | Oklahoma | 77.40% |
| 5 | USC | 75.97% |
| 6 | TCU | 75.54% |
| 7 | Bama | 74.19% |
| 8 | Texas | 73.94% |
| 9 | Wiscy | 73.79% |
| 10 | GA | 72.22% |
| 11 | VA Tech | 72.11% |
| 12 | UF | 71.13% |
| 13 | Auburn | 70.42% |
| 14 | FSU | 69.40% |
| 15 | Utah | 69.07% |
| 16 | WVA | 68.57% |
| 17 | Louisville | 67.39% |
| 18 | Missouri | 67.13% |
| 19 | PSU | 66.91% |
| 20 | Clemson | 66.90% |
| 21 | Nebraska | 65.04% |
| 22 | OK State | 65.00% |
| 23 | South Car | 64.29% |
| 24 | MSU | 63.12% |
| 25 | Texas Tech | 62.59% |
| 26 | ND | 61.87% |
| 27 | GA Tech | 61.38% |
| 28 | Rutgers | 60.00% |
| 29 | Iowa | 59.71% |
| 30 | Michigan | 59.42% |
Some takeaways:
- Over a 30ish year time frame 6 teams clearly stand out at 73%+ - FSU, Neb, OSU, Miami FL, Florida, Oklahoma. From there we have a significant 3% drop to the cabal of UM, Auburn, PSU, GA.
- While lacking the # of NCs of Bama, no way to say it other than OSU has been the the best program in terms of consistency for 20 years. And aside from FSU is essentially tied for 2nd over 30 years. A hell of a multi decade run.
- Despite some fall off post Bowden, FSU has had an amazing 30 year run.
- I doubt most would guess LSU was #2 over the past 11 years. I wouldn't.
- Nebraska had such a good mid 80s to early 2000s it has offset the relative mediocrity of late.
- Oregon has been better for longer than I assumed.
- While UM has been wholly mediocre relative to perceived status for 10 and 20 years, ND has been mediocre for all 3 time frames which is suprising considering Holtz era.
- For all the TX angst they have had a nice run the past 20 years.
- Despite not even being found in the top 30 the past 11 years, Miami is still #4 overall over 30.
- Wisconsin is impressive - Alvarez did a hell of a job not only building a program but despite the coaching changes leaving a legacy. Let's hope Dantonio does not do the same.
- Rutgers was not such a bad addition to the Big 10 ;)
- As suspected UCLA is a chronic underachiever considering all the assets at their disposal.
February 25th, 2015 at 10:01 PM ^
February 25th, 2015 at 10:08 PM ^
remarkably hasn't had any significant downturn since Woody. And unfortunately it would take something astounding for it to happen under Meyer.
February 25th, 2015 at 10:21 PM ^
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February 25th, 2015 at 11:14 PM ^
It may have felt like mediocrity at the time but Lloyd was usually good for 10 wins. The real reason we have a bad record in the last 10 and 20 years is becuase of the horrid stretch of 7 years under RR and Hoke (- Sugar Bowl).
February 26th, 2015 at 6:45 PM ^
out of 13 seasons. That's less than 50 percent of the time. There were three other nine win seasons but we played 13 games both times. The first time was thanks to the Pigskin Classic and the other time was the Cap One Bowl in LC's last year. Lloyd won 70%+ only five of his last eight seasons.
February 26th, 2015 at 6:49 PM ^
February 26th, 2015 at 7:30 AM ^
February 26th, 2015 at 12:06 PM ^
They were trending downward under Earle Bruce. He didn't recruit that well (which is hard to imagine at OSU) and their talent level by the end of his tenure wasn't what it had been. John Cooper then inherited a pretty bad team and went 4-6-1 in 1988.
February 25th, 2015 at 10:18 PM ^
They don't care about anything but football? They've won 5 big ten titles and been to a national title game and another final four under Matta.
February 25th, 2015 at 10:21 PM ^
Their basketball team is not nearly as popular as their football team. The discrepancy is unreal b/c Matta and co deserve way more recognition.
February 25th, 2015 at 10:38 PM ^
Neither is ours outside of this blog.
I don't know if you're aware but Michigan didn't sell out every game even during the Fab Five era. Our basketball fans are not really very die hard as shown by the empty seats during the OSU game on Sunday.
February 25th, 2015 at 10:49 PM ^
That might be a stretch. I would say both basketball and hockey matter a lot more to UM than basketball and hockey does to OSU.
Hell during my time at Michigan the past few years the campus was almost equatable to football season during basketball season. (Obviously that is b/c of football being down)
I think Michigan has a solid appreciation for all 3 revenue sports.
Edit: I was about 0-1 years old during the Fab Five era so nope I don't know lol. I would think basketball attendance is better nowadays? That is just my guess though.
February 26th, 2015 at 8:13 AM ^
I will not argue hockey as it is definitely more popular to UM fans. Though, the fact that hockey is vastly more popular in the State of Michigan due to geographical differences and the success of the Red Wings has a lot to do with that. But, what is your argument that Michigan basketball is more important to UM fans than OSU basketball is to OSU fans? Ohio State, on average, has ranked in the top-10 nationally in attendance since Thad has arrived. Granted, a lot of that has to do with the size of your arena, but selling on average 16-17 thousand tickets per game is no small feat. And how about the frustration with Thad that many OSU fans have shared because OSU has (relatively) struggled the last two years (despite being tournament teams both years)? Doesn't that show that OSU fans care about the success and/or failure of the basketball team?
I am not exactly sure how you measure how much one school cares about a particular sport so the argument is probably dumb to begin with. And I am certainly not saying that OSU is not a football school and forever will be. But you don't become the best program in terms of success of both the football and basketball programs (perhaps, second to only Florida) without caring about both sports tremendously.
February 25th, 2015 at 10:31 PM ^
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February 25th, 2015 at 10:48 PM ^
Ah good old UMx, always there to vigorously defend our rivals from even the slightest criticism.
February 25th, 2015 at 11:07 PM ^
Just tired of seeing them winning a lot is all...
February 25th, 2015 at 11:21 PM ^
February 25th, 2015 at 11:29 PM ^
You really think Michigan fans care about basketball that much? For 90% of Michigan fans basketball is just something to watch until football starts back up. Most pretended like it didn't even exist during the Ellerbe/Amaker years.
Football is king at Michigan hence why we got the athletic director fired for fucking up the football program while the rest of the sports have been doing pretty damn well.
And I don't know where you get this notion that OSU isn't any good at other sports besides football. They routinely do very well in the director's cup just like Michigan.
Just because I can admit that they're good doesn't mean I don't hate the shit out of them.
February 25th, 2015 at 11:39 PM ^
We've had 16 top ten finishes in the Director's cup. OSU has had 7. Across all sports, we've been the superior athletic program since records have been kept.
February 26th, 2015 at 3:33 AM ^
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February 26th, 2015 at 11:59 AM ^
Are we really arguing about superiority based on our caring more about other sports than you do? I mean, shit, there's good trash talk and then there's just... trash.
February 26th, 2015 at 7:39 AM ^
February 26th, 2015 at 10:28 AM ^
although in certain situations I just can't stop myself from doing it. Usually when talking to a MSU fan. It absolutely enrages them.
February 26th, 2015 at 11:10 AM ^
February 26th, 2015 at 8:05 AM ^
Texas cares about football as much as, or even more than Ohio but they haven't gotten it done in a long time. That is a crumbling program. You have to hand it to OSU in terms of results. I suspected they were pretty successful, and now we have the metrics. We'll be back too.
February 25th, 2015 at 10:02 PM ^
Has OSU ever had a coaching failure (discluding beating Michigan) with W/L record?
Their coaches before Woody must have been downright awful because their win % should be a lot higher overall.
Hopefully Michigan can snag back the #1 spot from ND next year.
February 25th, 2015 at 10:11 PM ^
ND returns the most starters in the nation in P5 so I would expect a quite good year for them - dont know if they have Clemson and/or FSU in their rotating ACC schedule. If Zaire is the truth, ND should have a very good year; I would not be surprised if this year's USC v ND game is a matchup of top 10s - both teams should have great years; USC scholarship reductions are going away and they probably have the most underrated QB in America. And their very young team finally has some whiskers.
February 25th, 2015 at 10:17 PM ^
http://www.und.com/sports/m-footbl/archive/nd-m-footbl-sched-2015.html
So they start the season against Texas, then go on to play Clemson, GTech, USC and Stanford...
That can easily be 4 losses (hopefully). Maybe BC pulls out an upset giving them 5. Then Michigan can sneak back to #1 going 9-3 or better... One can dream.
February 25th, 2015 at 10:26 PM ^
Texas still needs to find an offense - I am a big Strong fan but they have no offense at this point. And Stanford loses the bulk of its defense - and returns a mediocre offense from last year. GA Tech might be their 2nd toughest game this year - Clemson I dont know enough about. Clemson is like how UM used to be in most of the Carr era - never quite as good as you expect them to be, always enter the year top 10-12ish, always lose some dumb games along the way.
I'd rank the toughness of schedule - USC, GA Tech, Clemson, Stanford/Texas. Weird to see them play so few Big 10 teams. No MSU even.
February 25th, 2015 at 10:32 PM ^
Clemson and GaTech are probably equal. Clemson's stud QB was injured this year.
February 25th, 2015 at 10:38 PM ^
But they lost their OC who unlike Urban/Herman was considered the brain of that team. Swinney was not impressive pre Morris. We'll see if he learned anything "under Morris".
February 25th, 2015 at 10:55 PM ^
February 25th, 2015 at 11:19 PM ^
When was the last time that happened?
February 25th, 2015 at 10:28 PM ^
Pre Woody:
523 328-158-37 .663
Woody/Post Woody:
724 535-174-15 .749
February 26th, 2015 at 3:30 AM ^
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February 26th, 2015 at 10:17 AM ^
it's a tough place to come out of alive.
Every single Ohio State coach since WWII has been fired/forced out. Every single one.
We'll see how Urban fares and if he can break the cycle and go out on his own terms.
February 26th, 2015 at 10:23 AM ^
This thread made me look over the pre Woody OSU history and its pretty interesting you say that. They had a lot of coaches winning at a .650 clip or more throughout the 1900s. You had to go back to the late 1800s to find one "stiff" who was .500.
By the way I went back 81 years and OSU had the #1 winning % in the country as well. So I was curious what the all time winning % was - OSU is now up to 72.0% and UM is at 72.9%. (ND 73.1%) Which is why its difficult to find a trailing period UM has a better winning % than OSU. Even in the early 1900s while Yost was dominant OSU still had 70% type win %s. You probably need to go back 100+ years to find UM with a better trailing winning % - which is why blaming Rich Rod's 3 years is silly. Even Hoke had 3 pretty typical regime for UM when you combine his first 3 season records. (65% win % his first 3 years)
So if people think we are trailing OSU because of 3 seasons of RR and one of Hoke they can believe that but its not reality - OSU has been excellent unfortunately for a very long time and all those years they won 1-2 more games than UM (even when UM won head to head) add up over the long run.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Ohio_State_Buckeyes_head_football_…
- Paul Brown was 68.5%
- Wes Fesler was 60.8%
- Francis Schmidt was 70.5%
- Sam Williaman was 69.5%
- John Wilce (very long time coach) was 68.8%
- Albert Hernstein was 73.1%
These are guys who aside from Wilce coached 30-50 games pre Woody. So even their "short timers" were winning at a clip of 70%ish by and large. Yost was at 83.3% for comparison. So these "mediocre" coaches were pretty damn good.
You have to go back to their 2nd coach of all time when they were just launching the program to find a .500 coach.
February 26th, 2015 at 11:24 AM ^
Even in the '90s when you were regularly beating our ass, we were winning two to three more games more per season. Which is why it was so goddamn frustrating. In 1995 and 1996 three and four loss Michigan teams beat undefeated OSU teams.
February 26th, 2015 at 12:20 PM ^
The flipside of it is that those were good Michigan teams that had underperformed until the Game.
February 26th, 2015 at 1:17 PM ^
Sure, but in the context of trying to understand why OSU's winning percentage is higher, going 11-1 is better than 9-3, even if the "1" was handed to you by the other guy.
February 25th, 2015 at 10:07 PM ^
My "dream scenario" here is for Harbaugh to be THE GUY who "decodes" Urban Meyer. I really want to see Meyer be another Cooper and lose the next ten games to Harbaugh. I still remember how Cooper's OSU teams would go into Michigan week with a lofty ranking and championship aspirations, only to have them crushed by the Maize and Blue.
It's all about the matchups. Stranger things have happened.
February 25th, 2015 at 10:12 PM ^
We'll see. Harbaugh did seem to have Oregon's number when he was at Stanford. However, I wouldn't bet on Harbaugh doing what Carr did to Cooper (or Tressel to Carr). I'll be happy with a .500 record or better against Meyer over the next 10 years, assuming he's there that long.
February 26th, 2015 at 1:15 AM ^
2007
Oregon won 55-31 at Stanford
2008
Oregon won 35-28 at Oregon
2009
Stanford won 51-42 at Stanford
2010
Oregon won 52-31 at Oregon
Overall, Harbaugh is 1-3 against them and his defense gave up on average 46 points against Oregon. I wouldnt' call that having Oregon's number especially when the defense was bleeding points against them.
February 26th, 2015 at 10:32 AM ^
Reality is Harbaugh's defense stunk until Vic Fangio came around in 2010. That is not surprising because (a) you can scheme a good offense to a degree (see Indiana) whereas it is difficult to scheme good defense (uhh see Indiana) - you simply need very good athletes that are well coached on defense to compete, esp against spreads and (b) Stanford did not have a bevy of great players early in his tenure. And (c) Jim is not a defensive coach.
There is no harm in admitting that - either is Urban Meyer. But both have an eye for talent for defensive coaches which is important - Jim sort of lucked out as Fangio was a gift of sorts from John - he was working in Baltimore before he left the NFL for 1 year to go to Stanford. But you see some former Harbaugh guys doing well at Stanford (Anderson) and with Durkin etc. And Meyer has had guys like Strong and plucked Ash who really improved OSU's D.
Here is Harbaugh's data from 2007-2010. Note the stark difference Fangio made in 2010.
| W/L | Tot Off | oFEI | oS&P+ | Tot Def | dFEI | dS&P+ | ||
| 2006 | 1-11 | 118 | - | 113 | 97 | - | 99 | |
| 2007 | 4-8 | 107 | 61 | 83 | 98 | 49 | 85 | |
| 2008 | 5-7 | 67 | 48 | 31 | 75 | 80 | 87 | |
| 2009 | 8-5 | 19 | 1 | 6 | 90 | 91 | 113 | |
| 2010 | 12-1 | 14 | 5 | 3 | 21 | 6 | 6 | |
| 2011 | 11-2 | 8 | 6 | 8 | 26 | 13 | 22 |
Look at Wisconsin this year - they have a very fine young defensive coordinator who worked wonders with them (they lost 8 of 11 starters and then lost both their DTs to injury vs LSU and lost them for much of the year). They still did fine with "good" athletes. Then they faced OSU buzz saw and their athletic deficiency was exposed. Now the plus side is UM recruits elite athletes on paper - so shouldnt be an issue here as long the coaching is solid on the defense. But defense is just difficult to play against elite offenses even if you have a lot going for you - a lot of Stanford wins of late vs Oregon were due to ball control offense and playing keep away as much as the defense.
February 25th, 2015 at 10:08 PM ^
Oregon had a very mediocre first 10 years in your timeframe, going 58-56 from 1984-1993. The next 10 were very good, going 84-38. This was the start of the Mike Bellotti era. Note that Bellotti won 10+ games 4 times, and is the first 10 game winner in UO history. Finally, they've been really amazing since 2008, winning at least 10 games every season, going 80-14 for an amazing win percentage of 85.11%. ohio state, by contrast, went 77-16 during that time period (including vacated games).
February 25th, 2015 at 10:14 PM ^
Yes Bellotti was basically their Alvarez. Well Phil Knight was their Alvarez but Bellotti was their football Alvarez. Main difference being while Wiscy has been "very good" (lots of Rose Bowls) they have just been a step below Oregon which has been in the elite category. Not "elite elite" i.e. winning NCs but a whisker away.
Considering how Oregon recruits - generally in the 10 to 15 area rather than 4-8 like most of the top 5-7ish programs they have overachieved for a long time. Wisconsin even more so considering they recruit in the 30s and 40s.
February 26th, 2015 at 12:22 PM ^
Rich Brooks was the guy who broke through in 1994 and took them to the Rose Bowl. Belotti built upon what Brooks started.
February 25th, 2015 at 10:10 PM ^
Yeah, seeing Wiscy and Oregon there in the 20 year timeframe was surprising.
FSU started heading downhill even before Bowden was forced out. That's why he was forced out. Having said that, they never dropped off THAT much. I wonder what their worst record was during that down period.
I don't wanna be fair to ND, but to be fair to ND, they do almost always play one of the toughest schedules. Scheduling is a big factor in a lot of these. The B1G has been really down, so that's why OSU is so high on there recently. Granted, those Bowden FSU teams were certainly elite, but it still helped playing in the ACC.
February 25th, 2015 at 10:21 PM ^
Between 1987 and 2000, FSU never lost more than 2 games - inclusive of their bowls. I dont care what damn conf you are in, with injuries, breaking in new QBs, that's just an amazing run for a decade and a half.
Speaking of - they went 11-3 in those years in bowls, playing in all BCS type bowls every year.
They had a flurry of 7-6 seasons in Bowden's late years.
Their last losing season was 1976; Bowden's first year. An amazing era. Esp considering the lack of tradition and the 3 years before Bowden showed up were a combined 4-29.
February 26th, 2015 at 10:01 AM ^
Florida State in the 90's was truly a dynasty we might not see again for a long time, if ever. If that current Oregon run is impressive, the FSU run is just ridiculous, with 2 MNCs and an .889 win rate. Their WORST season during that run was 10-2. This was really around the time I started following college football and it was all about the 'Noles back then.