USC takes the belt, 24–14, on the road at UCLA.
AP poll, week 12: USC No. 3 at UCLA No. 6 · No. 1 that week: Penn State. The belt vs. the polls →
Where this game sits in the lineage
USC took the belt here, ending UCLA’s run of 324 days and 10 defenses (reign #161) and starting reign #162. It lasted 322 days and 6 defenses, until Alabama took it on October 8, 1977.
For USC this was its 8th shot at the belt; it had held the belt 4 times before — and it took it back here.
It was the first of 9 meetings between the two with the belt on the line; all-time USC leads 7–2. Every meeting →
About this game
USC visited UCLA on November 20, 1976, in a regular season matchup. UCLA won the game 24-14, but USC took the belt on the field with the victory. This was belt game #1008.
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 47094) · This game in the downloadable dataset