Wisconsin takes the belt, 21–14, at home over Michigan.
AP poll, week 2: Michigan No. 1 at Wisconsin unranked · No. 1 that week: Penn State. The belt vs. the polls →
Where this game sits in the lineage
Wisconsin took the belt here, ending Michigan’s run of 254 days and 0 defenses (reign #169) and starting reign #170. It lasted 7 days and 0 defenses, until UCLA took it on September 19, 1981.
For Wisconsin this was its 9th shot at the belt; it had held the belt once before — and it took it back here.
It was the 2nd of 2 belt games between the two; going in, the series stood 0–0–1; all-time Wisconsin leads 1–0–1.
About this game
Wisconsin defeated Michigan 21-14 on September 12, 1981, in the second week of the regular season. With this victory, Wisconsin took the College Football Belt from Michigan on the field.
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 50574) · This game in the downloadable dataset