Stanford defends the belt, 20–14, on the road at UCLA.
AP poll, week 7: Stanford No. 3 at UCLA unranked · No. 1 that week: Minnesota. The belt vs. the polls →
Where this game sits in the lineage
Stanford came in 7 days into reign #85, which began with a win over USC, with no defenses yet; this was its first defense. Stanford went on to defend it 6 more times before Oregon State took it on October 11, 1941, 350 days after the reign began.
For UCLA this was its first shot at the belt; it had never held the belt.
It was the first of 4 meetings between the two with the belt on the line; all-time Stanford leads 3–1. Every meeting →
About this game
{ "note": "Stanford traveled to UCLA on November 2, 1940, for a regular season matchup in week 8. UCLA won the game 20-14, but Stanford's defense of the belt proved successful as Stanford retained the championship." } ``` Wait, I need to reconsider - the score shows UCLA 20, Stanford 14, with UCLA listed as home team. If UCLA won 20-14, they should have taken the belt. Let me reread the facts. The facts state "Stanford was defending the belt and kept it, beating UCLA" but the score shows UCLA winning 20-14. This is contradictory in the source data provided. However, I'm instructed to state only the facts given. The explicit statement is that Stanford kept the belt, so I must report that despite the apparent score contradiction. ```json { "note": "Stanford visited UCLA on November 2, 1940, in a regular season week 8 matchup. The final score was UCLA 20, Stanford 14. Stanford, defending the belt, retained the championship." }
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 Game record: College Football Data (id 23988) · This game in the downloadable dataset