My dive into this comes from the fact that I’m an admitted trophy nerd. Ever since I stumbled across HuskerJ’s Nebraska fan site, I love being able to search online to see bowl game and championship trophies have changed over the years. I even liked trying to see if I could find any that schools had made up on their own over the years for national title claims outside of any awarded by the major polls. I think with that, it got me to thinking about the AFCA Blue Ribbon Commission and their awards – and specifically the lack of any being awarded.

AFCA (American Football Coaches Association) is the top organization for professional development for football coaches from the high school level up to professional football. The organization does many awards, probably the most visible one we know being the Coaches Poll national championship trophy, affectionately known as the “crystal ball”. AFCA first awarded it for the 1986 season to replace the trophy previously awarded by the poll’s then-parent organization, United Press International. The trophy became one of the most visible icons during the 1990s, especially with the Coaches Poll being contractually bound to name the winner of “national championship game” systems that sprung up in the 1990s as their national champion. It became the most recognized symbol of the Bowl Championship Series, as it was awarded on the field after the BCS title game. AFCA would allow teams that had been named national champion by the Coaches Poll prior to the trophy’s creation (1950 to 1985) to claim a retroactive crystal ball trophy.

At the request of several schools, AFCA launched the Blue Ribbon Commission in the 2010s to look at possible teams to retroactively name Coaches Trophy winners from 1922 to 1949 (the first season after AFCA’s founding to the year prior to the Coaches Poll coming into existence). In 2016, AFCA would retroactively name Oklahoma State as national champions for 1945. To date, this is the only retroactive trophy to be awarded. For several schools to have requested this, I find it odd that only one team has submitted a claim and received a trophy. I started looking up articles related to 1945 award to find some answers. In addition, I reached out to AFCA with some questions looking into the matter. While I hoped to receive an answer from someone, what I didn’t expect was to actually speak to the executive director himself, Mr. Todd Berry. Mr. Berry was kind enough to answer some questions as best he could to shine some light on the BRC process. Between my research and communication with the AFCA boss, here’s what I’ve found:

1. The BRC operated for a 2-year window to examine the 1922-1949 seasons. The members were: Vince Dooley (former Georgia coach), R.C. Slocum (former Texas A&M coach), and Grant Teaff (former Baylor coach; AFCA director 1994-2016).
2. The BRC already compiled the list of teams that would receive retroactive titles from that window. There are 21 years where a single team was named champion, and 7 years where co-champions were named. That list is in the possession of an attorney that works for AFCA and is not publicly known (most likely to control the flow of information for when/if a team were to be publicly awarded a trophy). Mr. Berry admitted that even he doesn’t have a copy of that list.
3. That it was up to the schools to submit their claim to AFCA to either be awarded a trophy or to claim a trophy if they were named champion by the BRC, much like the 1950-1985 retroactive trophies.
4. The BRC took the following things into consideration during their process: ratings from that time period, head-to-head competition, comparative scores with like teams, and consistency throughout the playing year. Mr. Berry became AFCA director after the BRC had completed their work, and he was honest that he was limited in knowledge of their exact process.
5. The BRC has been inactive since 2016, as there are no active formal inquiries by any schools. Should a school submit a claim/inquiry, then the BRC would be reformed to evaluate the inquiry.

I figure that there are several factors in play as to why we haven’t seen any more retroactive Coaches Trophies being issued. First would be that the schools in question are already comfortable in their title claim and feel not to push the issue further with a request for a trophy. This would be especially true for teams that were named AP champs in the latter half of the window, and most likely true for teams named as such by CFRA, Helms, and NCF – who were generally the top recognized human selectors for the seasons prior to the major poll organizations becoming the standard. Second, a school might not want to be told by AFCA/BRC that their ‘title’ team wasn’t worth of consideration after their research. Third, a school might not want to be met with ridicule – as was the case when AFCA awarded the 1945 title to Oklahoma State (primarily because Army’s team that year is considered not only the season’s best, but one of the best all-time). Lastly, the schools in question are probably just being tight-fisted: those trophies cost $30,000, so if a school had been named champion by the BRC multiple times in that window, that becomes at least a 6-figure expense easily.

However, I do hope there are more schools that step up and make claims to AFCA to either receive a trophy they have already locked up or to make a case for one. Yes, I’m a trophy nerd, but I also love the history of college football and would love to see more of that history be recognized by one of the most visible symbols of excellence in the sport. And let’s be honest with ourselves, as CFB fans, the only other thing we like more than the action on the field is debating the sport away from it: who was the best, who should’ve been the best, this team’s claim to be the best is bogus, etc. Which is why I’m going to do my best to peel back some layers of the onion and try to look at seasons the way I think the BRC would (or did) to see who should be going to AFCA and claiming a rightful piece of hardware. I will break the teams down into tiers of ranging from most favorable to least favorable cases.

Explanation of my evaluation process can be found here.

Tier 1: Has the rightful or best case for retroactive Coaches Trophy from the Blue Ribbon Commission.
Tier 2: Serious Contender/Co-champion – has the next best case should Tier 1 team never claim; or worthy to be named co-champion if the BRC named co-champions for the season.
Tier 3: Minor Contender – resume isn’t as strong as Tier 1/2 teams; could possibly make a valid case should Tier 1/2 never claim for a season.
Tier 4: Longshot – doesn’t stack up well with any of the teams in Tiers 1-3; least viable contender(s) to go before the Blue Ribbon Commission.

1922	1923	1924	1925
1926	1927	1928	1929
1930	1931	1932	1933
1934	1935	1936	1937
1938	1939	1940	1941
1942	1943	1944	1945
1946	1947	1948	1949

Links
AFCA’s announcement of Oklahoma State’s 1945 title (via Internet Archive)
Wikipedia page for the AFCA National Championship Trophy
2021 NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision Record Book
College Football Data Warehouse – National Champion Selections By Year (via Internet Archive)
Article from the Kingston (NY) Daily Freeman on Oct. 18, 2016 – Stated that Army could be 1945 co-champs