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Cheese is also throwing in titles from sports - basically everything other than football and men's basketball in March - that people really don't give a shite about.

In the north, folks care about hockey and in the south they care about baseball. As for the other sports it is a rough gauge of balance than football only schools. Women's basketball is selling tickets and I have been to Joyce and seen firsthand the Irish fans filling it for women's basketball. Granted it does not have the same pull as CFB, but when you put 400K though the gates at LSU for baseball in a season or fill a 20K venue for women's basketball in Knoxville it is clear somebody is paying to see it and some of those are paying good money as Lady Vols run about $ 1,300 a seat a season after the required "donation"

As for Clemson in 81, yes they went undefeated but played in an ACC back then that did not include Florida State, Miami, Virginia Tech, and the others since expansion.

Clemson 81 = Wofford, Tulane, UGA by 10 @ home, Kentucky, Virginia, Duke, NC State, Wake Forest, UNC, Maryland, and SC (pre SEC) and a large section of schools could have a similar record that season. Basically the Taters got UGA and Nebraska (in bowl) as a two game run to the NC.

Imagine for a second tho that Donald Trump does not end Herschel Walkers time at Georgia a year early and he plays for Georgia that season. 10 point loss to Clemson and 4 point loss to Pittsburgh and the Dawgs are undefeated and getting back to back Natties.

Winning a Natty is a big deal and takes a team, favorable schedule, and a bit of good fortune like UGA losing HW to Trump. However, if modern rules applied, it seems certain that BYU's Natty in 1984 falls away. In 1981, Nebraska had 3 losses but played a ranked Florida State and a ranked Penn State along with a schedule that had no FCS schools like Wofford and had only P5 opponents including Iowa and Auburn out of conference. Imagine if the schedules were swapped that year and Nebraska played the Clemson schedule that year, they may go undefeated and Clemson playing Nebraska's schedule has a loss or two in the regular season.

The debate continues today in the debate between 8 and 9 conference games and how the P5's are not all created equal so going undefeated is also unequal by seasons end and the pollsters do reward on 0 losses over SoS no matter how much they say they don't.

If you really wanted a starting point then the 1st BCS might be a s good as any on a "future" crystal ball on who really matters in CFB today.

1998 Tennessee - downhill since losing the fat man
1999 Florida State - able to replace Bowden with Jimbo
2000 Oklahoma -with Stoops
2001 Miami - the "U" is now just a u
2002 Ohio State - able to replace the vest with CUM
2003 LSU with Saban / USC with Carroll
2004 USC with Carroll - now vacated
2005 Texas - downhill since butter tooth
2006 Florida - with CUM
2007 LSU - with Miles (could be the next Tennessee post fat man)
2008 Florida - with CUM
2009 Alabama - with Saban
2010 Auburn - with Cam
2011 Alabama - with Saban
2012 Alabama - with Saban
2013 Florida State - with Jimbo
2014 Ohio State - with CUM
2015 Alabama - with Saban
2016 Clemson - with Dabo

The "real" reality may be it is just the Saban and CUM show going forward till one or both of them retire and everybody else is just hoping to get a Natty when one of them lose a game. Maybe Clemson goes back to back and pulls at least even with Florida State but they could equally go the way of Miami or Tennessee in the modern world.

If I were trying to predict the future (assuming head injuries don't end the sport) the networks will want the predictable eyeballs and the AD's will want the biggest live audiences across a given conference. Only the B1G and SEC seem so poised to own that future. Florida State and Clemson are outliers in ACC football.

The question may be who goes to Alabama after Saban because if Dabo left Clemson for Tuscaloosa then all Clemson is today will be dust in the wind tomorrow.

Good post - seriously.

I stridently disagree with you on the minor sports thing, though. I like the Lady Irish as much as anyone, but the impact on economics, academic prestige, and so forth is but a blip. ND also cares a lot about soccer (men's and women's), hockey, and lacrosse, and we are elite in all of them, but they just don't really matter all that much in the end.

As for Clemson, most conferences back then were one or two giants and then a bunch of dwarves, including the SEC. The Big Eight was Oklahoma, Nebraska, and then... The SEC was Alabama, Tennessee (most years), occasionally LSU or Ole Miss or UGA but not consistently... The SWC was Texas and then occasionally Arkansas or whoever... The PAC 10 was USC, Washington, and...

I don't find that particularly persuasive. The only teams that played truly difficult schedules from front to back back then were the independents - ND, Miami, FSU, Penn State, etc.