Miami defends the belt, 45–3, at home over West Virginia.
AP poll, week 10: West Virginia unranked at Miami No. 1 · No. 1 that week: Maryland. The belt vs. the polls →
Where this game sits in the lineage
Miami came in 383 days into reign #253, which began with a win over Florida State, with 12 defenses already behind it; this was its 13th defense. Miami went on to defend it 18 more times before Ohio State took it on January 3, 2003, 818 days after the reign began.
For West Virginia this was its 6th shot at the belt; it had never held the belt.
It was the first of 2 meetings between the two with the belt on the line; all-time Miami leads 2–0.
About this game
Miami defeated West Virginia 45-3 on October 25, 2001, in week 10 of the regular season. As the belt's defending holder, Miami retained the championship with the victory.
Written by Claude, strictly from this site’s own record of the game — the score and what it meant for the belt. CFBD doesn’t have a box score for games this old, so nothing here is invented beyond what’s verifiably on file.
Sources Box score at ESPN · Game record: College Football Data (id 212982390) · This game in the downloadable dataset