Joel Klatt picks hypothetical CFP with his top four teams since 2000, Top 10 teams of 21st century

There have been a bevy of storied teams in college football just since the calendar flipped into the new millennia. And Fox Sports’ Joel Klatt took a stab at sorting out the best of the best in nearly a quarter century since 2000.

It’s no easy task, with far more than 10 teams deserving of a spot in the Top 10 ranking that Klatt determined. And from that ranking, he gamed out a four-team playoff from his four best teams of the century, so far.

See Klatt’s Top 4 college football teams of the century and how he thinks they’d shake out in a hypothetical four-team College Football Playoff.

No. 4: 2019 LSU

Teams go on heaters and then they do what LSU did in 2019. The signs began to show that this team and the critical mass of elite NFL talent — Joe Burrow, Justin Jefferson, Ja’Marr Chase — could do special things when the Tigers rolled through Texas in Week 2.

Klatt placed the 2019 Tigers at No. 4 relative to the teams ahead of them for one reason: An occasionally suspect defense. The Tigers managed to get by with the No. 32 overall defense in the country that season, leaning on the offense and swing plays from the defense, like turnovers and sacks.

No. 3: 2004 USC

Much like the aforementioned Tigers (and really any team in this exercise), the 2004 USC Trojans were loaded with NFL talent. But no player shined brighter on that team or in college football then than Reggie Bush.

But these Trojans, with Matt Leinart at quarterback and LenDale White joining Bush in the backfield, were far more than one player. Klatt comfortably had them in his Top 4.

No. 2: 2005 Texas

Klatt, who played quarterback at Colorado, actually played against the 2005 Texas team, twice: Once in the regular season and again in the Big 12 Championship Game. The combined score of those two games? 112-20, with a 70-3 beat down in the title game.

Like USC in ’04 and LSU in ’19, this team also featured a Heisman winner: Quarterback Vince Young, in this case. Klatt had no qualms putting Texas very near the top of his list.

No. 1: 2001 Miami (FL)

When it comes to the top teams of the 21st century, one of the very first still holds serve: The 2001 Miami Hurricanes. A team that had 11 eventual first round picks out of 22 starters deserves a spot atop this ranking.

And the names on that Miami team are a whos who of elite football players of the 2000s (and beyond): Andre Johnson, Clinton Portis, Jonathan Vilma, Ed Reed, Sean Taylor, Vince Wilfork, Bryant McKinnie, Jeremy Shockey, Willis McGahee and beyond. The ’01 Hurricanes remain No. 1 without a doubt.

Semifinal No. 1: 2001 Miami beats 2019 LSU

Klatt likes to imagine this matchup taking place in the Orange Bowl, a fitting setting for two southern powers — particularly Miami. And while it would be a matchup filled with fireworks, he ultimately thinks chalk wins out and the Hurricanes advance to the title.

And it comes down to defense. Where the LSU outfit was prone to giving up a bust or two and had maybe one or two holes, the Miami defense had none, in Klatt’s eyes.

Semifinal No. 2: 2004 USC beats 2005 Texas

A quasi-version of the BCS National Championship game we got in January of 2006 to crown the 2005 champion, a game that Texas won. But that was 2005, not 2004, USC that Texas beat.

And for Klatt’s money, the ’04 vintage of the Trojans was the best. Given that Texas only beat the ’05 Trojans on a fourth down scramble from Young — and the game could’ve been iced with a USC fourth-down conversion on the preceding drive — Klatt has the Trojans advancing past the Longhorns.

Championship: 2004 USC beats 2001 Miami

A leviathan hypothetical matchup with NFL talent all over the field. Klatt suspects if these teams could actually meet, it’d be the best college football game of all time.

And his pick to win is perhaps a surprising one: ’04 USC. While there might not be a hole in sight on the Miami lineup, Klatt likes the star power of the Trojans, who at that point had a pair of eventual Heisman winners on the roster in Bush and Leinart.

It might not be a popular pick, but it’s one that rife for discussion — as is the whole exercise.

The rest of Klatt’s all-21st Century Top 10 teams was as follows:

5. 2020 Alabama
6. 2018 Clemson
7. 2021 Georgia
8. 2008 Florida
9. 2013 Florida State
10. 2000 Oklahoma

And that leaves off a handful of elite Ohio State teams, among others, a reflection of the difficulty of the exercise of sorting the best teams of the last 20-plus years into a CFP field.