You will automatically think the answer is Alabama has the most American football championship simply because of recency bias and that is OK. Because we have to go back 150 years ago to find the #1 team to have won the most championships.
In 1869, the first national college football championship was held. This season lasted eight days and featured two games: Princeton versus Rutgers (which Rutgers won) and Rutgers versus Princeton (which Princeton won).
Later, the Billingsley Report and the National Championship Foundation named Yale the first national champion, whereas in 1933, college football historian Parke H. Davis concluded that Rutgers and Yale shared the title.
Here are the criteria used to compile this list. Only teams that competed in the highest national division at the time are included. This implies that teams that are no longer a part of FBS football will be listed here. It also excludes FCS, whose first champion was crowned in 1978.
Only three of Alabama’s 16 NCAA championships prior to the poll era came before the poll era. With the 16th title, a victory in the College Football Playoff in 2020, Nick Saban surpassed Bear Bryant’s record of seven championships.
The Actual #1 – Yale
OK, now that we got that out of the way let’s talk about the real #1.
Yale football has one of the most remarkable credentials in the sport, having produced two of the first three Heisman Trophy winners, 100 All-Americans, 28 Hall of Fame inductees, and 18 NCAA-recognized national championships — the most ever.
Free football picks says you will never see Yale win another football national championship because they aren’t even in the same class as the other schools currently competing. They are hanging on for dear life to that #1 spot.
