Princeton defends the belt, 76–6, on the road at Wesleyan (CT).
Where this game sits in the lineage
Princeton came in 364 days into reign #7, which began with a win over Yale, with 7 defenses already behind it; this was its 8th defense. Princeton went on to defend it 8 more times before Harvard took it on November 12, 1887, 721 days after the reign began.
For Wesleyan (CT) this was its 8th shot at the belt; it had never held the belt. It still hasn’t: 30 attempts in all, every one of them a loss or a tie.
It was the first of 4 meetings between the two with the belt on the line; all-time Princeton leads 4–0. Every meeting →
About this game
Princeton traveled to Wesleyan (CT) on November 20, 1886, in a regular-season matchup where Wesleyan (CT) defeated the belt-holding Princeton 76-6. Princeton retained the College Football Belt despite the loss.
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 394) · This game in the downloadable dataset