Alternate universes
The belt has exactly one rule and one starting point. Change either and the same 110,113 games produce a different history — sometimes a wildly different one. These are four of them, computed the same way as the real belt, over every game since 1869.
Notre Dame
Whoever beats the holder takes it; a pre-overtime tie stayed with the holder; bowls count; since Rutgers–Princeton, 1869.
332 reigns105 programsthe one that counts
Ties pass the beltNotre Dame same as the real belt
A tie hands the belt to the challenger instead of leaving it with the holder.
409 reigns107 programsagrees with the real belt 48% of the time
Bowls don't countOhio State
Postseason games can't move the belt; the holder carries it through the winter untouched.
322 reigns109 programsagrees with the real belt 54% of the time
The poll eraNotre Dame same as the real belt
The belt is born the week the first AP poll comes out, in October 1936, held by that poll's No. 1.
257 reigns80 programsagrees with the real belt 100% of the time
The BCS eraNotre Dame same as the real belt
The belt starts with the 1998 preseason AP No. 1 and follows the modern game from there.
103 reigns48 programsagrees with the real belt 85% of the time
Every universe uses the real engine with one change. A holder that stops playing (a program that dropped football, or vanishes from the record) hands the belt back to the program it took it from, the same rule the FBS and FCS scopes use. Agreement is the share of days since the universe began on which it and the real belt named the same holder.