USC defends the belt, 17–10, at a neutral site over Michigan.
AP poll, week 14: Michigan No. 5 at USC No. 3 · No. 1 that week: Penn State. The belt vs. the polls →
Where this game sits in the lineage
USC came in 51 days into reign #167, which began with a win over Washington, with 3 defenses already behind it; this was its 4th defense. USC went on to defend it 20 more times before Washington took it on November 15, 1980, 735 days after the reign began.
For Michigan this was its 18th shot at the belt; it had held the belt 3 times before.
It was the 3rd of 4 belt games between the two; going in, USC led the belt series 2–0; all-time USC leads 4–0. Every meeting →
About this game
On January 1, 1979, USC defeated Michigan 17-10 in a postseason matchup to retain the College Football Belt. As the defending belt holder, USC's victory kept the belt in their possession.
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 48834) · This game in the downloadable dataset