Washington defends the belt, 31–21, at home over Arizona.
AP poll, week 10: Arizona unranked at Washington No. 19 · No. 1 that week: Navy. The belt vs. the polls →
Where this game sits in the lineage
Washington came in 7 days into reign #166, which began with a win over Arizona State, with no defenses yet; this was its first defense. It was the last defense: USC took the belt in the very next belt game, on November 11, 1978.
For Arizona this was its 2nd shot at the belt; it had never held the belt.
It was the first of 5 meetings between the two with the belt on the line; all-time Washington leads 4–1. Every meeting →
About this game
Washington defended the belt at home on November 4, 1978, defeating Arizona 31-21 in week 10 of the regular season. With the victory, Washington retained the lineal 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 48627) · This game in the downloadable dataset