Revealing college football's Top 5 'what-if' teams that missed out on winning it all

Most teams finish their respective seasons thinking that they could have, would have, or should have won it all. However, for some, that actually might have been the case had it not been for how a handful of aspects turned out in their respective seasons and, on Thursday, On3’s Andy Staples picked some where he thought that that was the case.

During his show this morning, Staples answered a question about teams in college football that he thought were close, yet just weren’t close enough, to achieving their ultimate goals.

In total, he named five from over the past three plus decades that he felt met that criteria.

2020 Florida

Florida went 8-4 in 2020 but started with a record of 8-1 for a team that spent the duration of the season in the Top-10. However, a loss to LSU, which was essentially caused by an unsportsmanlike conduct flag on DB Marco Wilson, crashed their season as they dropped their last three, including the SEC Championship to Alabama and the Cotton Bowl to Oklahoma. Since then, the Gators have posted three straight losing campaigns.

“The shoe throw is, at this point, kind of the albatross that’s hanging over Florida football. Like, what could have happened without the shoe throw? How different might things have been? Would the SEC Championship have played out differently or been different if Florida had been a one-loss team going into that?” asked Staples. “If it was undefeated against undefeated, Florida vs. Alabama, does that change the result of the game? I don’t know.”

2007 West Virginia

Staples’ next pick were the Mountaineers in 2007. They finished at 11-2 but missed out on an appearance in the national championship with a loss to their biggest rival to end the season. An injury to their star quarterback was a big cause of that eventual defeat that cost them their chance at their first title.

“What if Pat White never dislocates his thumb in the second quarter of the Pittsburgh game? It’s a 13-9 Pittsburgh win in that Backyard Brawl,” said Staples. “Pat McAfee missed two field goals. He has talked about what life was life for him after missing those two field goals in that game. If Pat White doesn’t get hurt? I don’t think that matters. I think West Virginia’s offense works well enough that they grind out that game. It probably wouldn’t have been a blowout by any stretch because, again, Pitt was playing really well. But that would’ve set up a West Virginia-Ohio State national championship, which, I think, West Virginia would have had a very good chance of winning. That is an all-time ‘What if?'”

1992 Florida State

The oldest pick by Staples came from 1992 in the form of Florida State. After a missed field goal by Gerry Thomas cost them versus Miami in 1991, Dan Mowrey did it again in the series in the next season. While both were brutal, the second was in its own way considering it was the one and only loss of their year.

“This is wide right two in 1992. Wide right one was later in the season and they were both undefeated when it happened,” said Staples. “Now, would Florida State have fared any better against Alabama in the Sugar Bowl than Miami did? I don’t know. But I would have been interested in seeing that because that was a Charlie Ward team. Charlie Ward ends up winning the national title in ’93 with Florida State, winning The Heisman Trophy. That ’92 Florida State team was really good too. That would have been a fun matchup with that Alabama team in the Sugar Bowl after the ’92 season.”

2004 Auburn

Unfortunately for Auburn, they’re not on this list for anything that they did. Nearly two decades ago, the Tigers went perfect at 11-0 before moving to 12-0 with a win in the SEC Championship. However, with the previous model, they weren’t selected to compete for a national title and, as such, have an undefeated finish without the ultimate prize to show for it.

“This was no fault of Auburn’s. Auburn just got screwed by the system. They were undefeated, they won the SEC. But USC and Oklahoma were picked to play for the national title. USC just crushed Oklahoma,” said Staples. “I would have enjoyed an Auburn-USC game. Like, it would have been fun if there were a four-team playoff and we got to see that after USC-Oklahoma. Or that would have been the first game to get to Oklahoma versus somebody else. That was the situation that caused Mike Slive, who was then the SEC Commissioner, to crusade for a College Football Playoff.”

2013 Alabama

Considering all of Alabama’s success under Nick Saban, it’s odd to see them on a list like this. With that said, they were on the wrong end of one of the sport’s all-time great plays to cost them their chance to win three straight national championships.

“This is the team that lost on the Kick Six to Auburn. They had not really been challenged that year except in that Texas A&M game – Johnny Manziel coming off of the Heisman Trophy, Mike Evans. Alabama kind of always stayed two scores up and ended up winning that game, 49-42. Then they kind of rolled through the rest of the schedule,” said Staples. “They get to Auburn, lose the Kick-Six game. This is an Alabama team trying to three-peat. They won in 2011 and 2012. The Kick-Six took them out of that. Nobody feels sorry for Alabama because they won all those national titles but I bet that team, against Florida State, would have been a ton of fun.”