1886 college football season

The 1886 college football season had no clear-cut champion, with the Official NCAA Division I Football Records Book listing Princeton and Yale as having been selected national champions.[1]

1886 college football season
1886 Yale Bulldogs
Champion(s)	Princeton Yale
football seasons

Conference and program changes

School	1885 Conference	1886 Conference
California Golden Bears	Program established	Independent

Season notes

On Thanksgiving Day in Princeton, NJ, undefeated teams from Yale and Princeton met. The game started late due to the absence of a referee, and heavy rain caused the game to be called on account of darkness with Yale leading 4–0 in the second half. Under the rules of the time, the game was declared "no contest" by the substitute referee, and the final score was declared to be 0–0. After a special meeting of the Intercollegiate Football Association held to review the game, the Association issued a two-part resolution - that (1) Yale should have been acknowledged the winner, but that (2) under their existing rules, the Association did not have the authority to award the game to them.[2]

The first intercollegiate game in the state of Vermont happened on November 6, 1886, between Dartmouth and Vermont at Burlington, Vermont. Dartmouth won 91 to 0.[3] Vermont was the last state in New England yet to have a football contest.

Conference standings

The following is a potentially incomplete list of conference standings:

1886 Northern Intercollegiate Football Association standings Conf     Overall Team W   L   T     W   L   T Williams $   –       4 – 1 – 1 Tufts   –       0 – 8 – 0 $ – Conference champion

Independents

1886 Eastern college football independents records Conf     Overall Team W   L   T     W   L   T Yale   –       9 – 0 – 1 Princeton   –       7 – 0 – 1 Harvard   –       12 – 2 – 0 Lafayette   –       10 – 2 – 0 Williams   –       5 – 1 – 1 Massachusetts   –       2 – 1 – 0 Penn   –       9 – 7 – 1 Lehigh   –       4 – 3 – 1 Dartmouth   –       2 – 2 – 0 Amherst   –       3 – 4 – 0 Rutgers   –       1 – 3 – 0 Wesleyan   –       2 – 6 – 0 MIT   –       2 – 6 – 1 Vermont   –       0 – 1 – 0 Stevens   –       0 – 7 – 1 Tufts   –       0 – 8 – 0 NYU   –       0 – 3 – 0 Swarthmore   –         –   Trinity (CT)   –         –	1886 Midwestern college football independents records Conf     Overall Team W   L   T     W   L   T Cincinnati   –       2 – 0 – 0 Michigan   –       2 – 0 – 0 Wabash   –       2 – 0 – 1 Albion   –       1 – 2 – 0 Northwestern   –       0 – 1 – 0 Minnesota   –       0 – 2 – 0	1886 Southern college football independents records Conf     Overall Team W   L   T     W   L   T Navy   –       3 – 3 – 0 Johns Hopkins   –       2 – 2 – 1 Richmond   –       1 – 1 – 0 Randolph–Macon   –         –
1886 Western college football independents records Conf     Overall Team W   L   T     W   L   T California   –       6 – 2 – 1

References

1. Official 2009 NCAA Division I Football Records Book (PDF). Indianapolis, IN: The National Collegiate Athletic Association. August 2009. p. 70. Retrieved October 16, 2009.
2. "No Football Champions.; But Princeton Challenges Yale To Another Game On Saturday". The New York Times. November 28, 1886.
3. "College Football Games". New York Times. November 7, 1886. p. 3. Retrieved March 27, 2015 – via Newspapers.com.