Football Version of the Final Four Is New Year’s Day

College football’s version of the Final Four takes place on New Year’s Day with four teams in the running for the national championship.

As 1985 draws to a close, the right to yell “We’re No. 1” belongs to Penn State, the nation’s only unbeaten and untied team.

Oklahoma Coach Barry Switzer, who politicked loud and long for the national championship a year ago only to see the Sooners embarrassed by Washington, 28-17, in the Orange Bowl, is leaving the shouting this time to Miami Coach Jimmy Johnson.

“With everything we’ve accomplished this year, in my mind we will be the national champions if we beat (No. 8) Tennessee (in the Sugar Bowl),” Johnson has said on occasion--a hundred or so occasions. “Considering the teams we’ve played (Florida, Oklahoma, Florida State, Maryland) and our record on the road (6-0), there’s no doubt we’re the best team in the country right now.”

Penn State (11-0) was ranked No. 1 in the Associated Press poll for the last five weeks of the regular season, can make it all academic by defeating No. 3 Oklahoma (10-1) in the Orange Bowl.

But if Oklahoma wins--or ties--everything will be up for grabs. The problem is that 10-1 and second-ranked Miami is the only team to beat Oklahoma. And the Hurricanes did it in Norman by a 27-14 score back in October.

In the previous 18 years in which the AP has conducted a post-bowl poll, the No. 1 team has lost its bowl game nine times (Oklahoma’s 1974 champs were on probation and didn’t go to a bowl). Five of those times, the team that beat No. 1 was voted the national champion. None of them, however, leaped over a team it had lost to earlier.

The only near-similarity occurred in 1978, when No. 2 Alabama defeated No. 1 Penn State 14-7 in the Sugar Bowl and won the national championship with an 11-1 record over 12-1 USC, which had whipped the Crimson Tide, 24-14, early in the season.

And in the midst of all the Penn State-Miami-Oklahoma fuss, fourth-ranked Iowa has been virtually ignored. The Hawkeyes take a 10-1 record into the Rose Bowl meeting with No. 13 UCLA, meaning that when the final gun sounds on the 1985 campaign, the top four teams in the final regular-season poll could all have 11-1 records.

The rest of the bowl picture will be for bragging rights. On Friday night, it was No. 12 LSU vs. Baylor in the Liberty Bowl.

The Saturday schedule had Arizona vs. Georgia in the Sun Bowl, No. 9 Brigham Young vs. No. 17 Ohio State in the Florida Citrus Bowl and No. 15 Alabama against USC in the Aloha Bowl, matching the two schools with the most bowl victories (21 for USC, 20 for Alabama).

On Monday, No. 18 Florida State meets No. 19 Oklahoma State in the Gator Bowl and Colorado faces Washington in the Freedom Bowl.

Tuesday finds No. 10 Air Force vs. Texas in the Bluebonnet Bowl, Army-Illinois in the Peach Bowl and Georgia Tech-Michigan State in the All-American Bowl.

To ring in 1986, No. 5 Michigan and No. 7 Nebraska square off in the Sunkist Fiesta Bowl and No. 11 Texas A&M; tangles with No. 16 Auburn in the Cotton Bowl, followed by the Rose, Sugar and Orange Bowls.

It is ironic that what is being billed as the national championship game will take place in the Orange Bowl, which is Miami’s home field during the regular season.

“This is what we play for, a chance to win a national championship,” Switzer says. “Penn State is obviously a fine team. They are well-coached and will have the incentive of knowing they will be the best if they win.”

Switzer is leaving much of the talking to others this time.

“If we could play Miami now, we could beat them,” says Jamelle Holieway, the freshman quarterback who took over Oklahoma’s Wishbone offense when Troy Aikman suffered a broken ankle in the Miami game. “But all we can do now is play Penn State, give it our best shot, try to win by a wide margin and win the national championship.”

All Switzer will say about the loss to Miami is, “You can look at it and say it was decisive, but it was a lot closer than the score indicates. We lose our quarterback and we don’t have (All-American nose guard Tony) Casillas. That makes a difference.”

Linebacker Roger Alexander, Penn State’s leading tackler, says the Nittany Lions are “going to have to play our best game all year. We’re playing for all the marbles.

While Oklahoma arrived in Miami on Dec. 20, Penn State didn’t head south until six days later.

“It’s not just a game that’s going to be played for a national championship, it’s also a bowl game and something the kids have worked awfully hard for,” Penn State Coach Joe Paterno says. “I think they want to have a good time.”

Oklahoma has the better statistics. The Sooners averaged 31.5 points a game during the regular season--37.7 in Holiway’s seven starts--to Penn State’s 24.1, and rolled up 427.0 yards a game to the Lions’ 321.2.

In rushing, Oklahoma was third nationally with 335.8 yards a game to Penn State’s 187.8. Only in passing do the Lions have an edge, 133.4 yards to 91.2. But Oklahoma, which threw only 111 passes to Penn State’s 248, completed 48.6 percent to the Lions’ 45.6.

On defense, the numbers are even more in Oklahoma’s favor. The Sooners led the nation in total defense, yielding just 193.5 yards a game, and passing defense at 103.6, while Penn State was 22nd overall (304.1) and 19th against the pass (156.9).

And Oklahoma was second in rushing defense (89.8) and scoring defense (8.5) to 35th (147.2) and fifth (11.6) for Penn State. Oklahoma even leads in net punting, 38.6 yards to 37.6, although John Bruno averaged 42.9 yards per kick to 39.9 for the Sooners’ Mike Winchester.

The key number, however, is in Penn State’s favor--11-0 to 10-1.

While Penn State is seeking its second national championship in four years, Miami is trying to make it two out of three. The Hurricanes’ pro-style passing attack features Vinny Testaverde, who finished fourth nationally in total offense and sixth in passing efficiency (352 attempts, 216 completions, 61.4 percent, 3,238 yards, 21 touchdowns, 15 interceptions).

Miami was fourth in scoring (36.3 points a game to Tennessee’s 26.4), sixth in total offense (461.5 yards to 384.8) and third in passing (318.3 to 234.5).

Defensively, Miami was 15th overall (293.3 to 307.3), but Tennessee allowed 12.1 points a game (seventh) to Miami’s 14.5.

Although the two schools have never met, the coaches are not strangers. When Tennessee’s Johnny Majors was the head man at Iowa State, Johnson was his defensive coordinator in 1968-69.

“They’ve got an explosive offense and a talented defense,” Majors says of Miami. “I think Oklahoma is mighty good, but Miami may be able to do more things, especially on offense. They can run and throw like no team you ever saw. They may very well be the best team in the nation for the way they are playing right now.”

Iowa is led by All-America quarterback Chuck Long, the first Big Ten passer to throw for 10,000 yards, and Larry Station, a two-time All-America linebacker.

The Hawkeyes set a school record with their 10 regular-season victories and Coach Hayden Fry says his team has “gotten to the point where we expect to win. We don’t have all that jumping up and down . . . it’s a very mature, solid ballclub. They’ve got their heads screwed on straight.

“As a coach, I’ve never been associated with three greater football players than Chuck Long, Larry Station and (tailback) Ronnie Harmon on the same team.”

Iowa finished second nationally in scoring (37.5 to UCLA’s 28.9), fourth in total offense (464.2 yards to 409.1) and fifth in passing (299.3 to 191.7). But although the Hawkeyes were fifth in total defense at 276.7, UCLA wasn’t far behind (seventh at 281.8).

UCLA will be playing in its fourth consecutive New Year’s Day bowl and third Rose Bowl in four years. And the Bruins will be trying to continue the Pac-10’s Rose Bowl dominance of the Big Ten, which stands at four in a row, 10 of 11 and 14 of 16.

The Cotton Bowl has had a bearing on the national championship only twice in the last 14 years, and then in negative fashion when Texas let its title hopes slip away in both 1977 and 1983. But for the second year in a row--and to celebrate its 50th anniversary game--it has the Heisman Trophy winner in Auburn tailback Bo Jackson, the second-leading rusher in Southeastern Conference history.

Auburn is making its first visit to Dallas, while Texas A&M; is in the Cotton Bowl for the first time since the 1967 season.

A&M; Coach Jackie Sherrill was a member of Alabama’s 1965 national champions and Auburn’s Pat Dye was an assistant coach under Bear Bryant that year.

The Fiesta Bowl matches two of the winningest major-college football programs. Michigan (9-1-1 in 1985) tops the list with 664 victories and Nebraska (9-2) is sixth with 602.

Nebraska’s string of 17 consecutive bowl appearances is the nation’s longest. The Cornhuskers also are in a New Year’s Day bowl for the fifth year in a row, for the seventh time in the last eight years and the 18th time overall.

The two powers first met in 1905 but have played only four times and not since 1962.

Michigan’s Bo Schembechler, the nation’s fourth-winningest coach with a .772 winning percentage, will be trying to improve on a 2-10 bowl record.