Alabama defends the belt, 16–10, at home over Ohio State.
AP poll, week 1: Ohio State No. 9 at Alabama No. 5 · No. 1 that week: Penn State. The belt vs. the polls →
Where this game sits in the lineage
Alabama came in 242 days into reign #195, which began with a win over USC, with no defenses yet; this was its first defense. Alabama went on to defend it 6 more times before Penn State took it on October 25, 1986, 301 days after the reign began.
For Ohio State this was its 12th shot at the belt; it had held the belt 5 times before.
It was the 2nd of 3 belt games between the two; going in, Alabama led the belt series 1–0; all-time Alabama leads 3–0. Every meeting →
About this game
Alabama hosted Ohio State on August 27, 1986, in the first week of the regular season, defeating the visiting Buckeyes 16-10. As the belt's defending holder, Alabama retained the championship with the victory.
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 54012) · This game in the downloadable dataset