Which college football dynasties have fallen on hard times across North Carolina sports betting? Utilizing Sports-Reference.com/CFB, BetCarolina.com broke down which of the top teams this century have dropped off the farthest from their heyday.
How did we break it down? By comparing their current five-year winning percentages with the high points in their recent histories.
As the college football season nears, go ahead and bookmark some our of tracking pages, such as: Clemson University Football Futures.
Champs Who Have Fallen Furthest | High Point | Current Point | Difference |
Florida | 2005-09: .851 | 2020-24: .524 | -.327 |
USC | 2002-06: .908 | 2020-24: .603 | -.305 |
Florida State | 2012-16: .868 | 2020-24: .550 | -.318 |
Miami (FL) | 2000-04: .887 | 2020-24: .607 | -.280 |
Auburn | 2006-2010: .723 | 2020-24: .459 | -.264 |
Oklahoma | 2000-04: .900 | 2020-24: .667 | -.233 |
Texas | 2001-05: .875 | 2020-24: .692 | -.183 |
Clemson | 2015-19: .932 | 2020-24: .758 | -.174 |
LSU | 2015-19: .785 | 2020-24: .635 | -.150 |
Alabama | 2015-19: .917 | 2020-24: 853 | -.064 |
Ohio State | 2012-16: .910 | 2020-24: .857 | -.053 |
While Clemson’s current stretch from 2020 onward falls well short of the glory days of 2015 to 2019, when the Tigers won two College Football Playoff championships and made the CFP four times in five years, the ACC power is still miles ahead of a few other former goliaths of the sport.
Those goliaths include SEC powers like Florida and Auburn, who have seen their win percentages drop off by .327 and .264 from their title-winning eras (2005 to 2009 for UF and 2006-2010 for Auburn), while the USC Trojans (-.305 from 2002-2006 to 2020-2024) and FSU Seminoles (-.318 from 2012-2016 to 2020-2024).
Much of Florida’s lack of success of late stems from the failure of head coaches like Will Muschamp, Jim McElwain, Dan Mullen and Billy Napier to live up to the lofty standard set by Urban Meyer, who went 65-15 (.813) during his six year stint in Gainesville, with Mullen coming the closest (with a 34-15 (.694) record from 2018 to 2021). Throw in the fact that Meyer coached several college and NFL stars, such as Heisman Trophy winning QB Tim Tebow, star wideout Percy Harvin (among many others) and you have a snapshot of why the Gators have fallen off since Meyer left ‘The Swamp’ 15 years ago.
The Trojans’ slide can be attributed to the fall of the Pete Carroll era in Los Angeles, with the Southern California power failing to live up to the 97-17 (.836) record set from 2001 to 2009, with proteges Lane Kiffin, Sarkisian and Clay Helton each finding themselves on the firing line between 2009 and 2022.
Other noteworthy CFB dynasties of old that have fallen by the wayside include the Miami Hurricanes, who have gone from having a winning percentage of .887 from 2000 to 2004 to today’s .607 figure from 2020 to 2024 under Mario Cristobal’s watch.
From there, you have another former SEC powerhouse program in the Auburn Tigers. They saw their aggregate five-year winning percentage plummet from .723 from 2006 to 2010 to .459 from 2020 to 2024, going from the highs of going 14-0 with Cam Newton at quarterback during his Heisman Trophy season in 2010 to the lows of the Hugh Freeze and Bryan Harsin eras, with four straight seven-loss seasons and zero bowl wins since 2018.
Finally, there's the Oklahoma Sooners, who went from winning the 2000 BCS title and posting a .900 win percentage from 2000 through 2004 to having a .667 percentage from 2020 to 2024 (or -.233).
The rest of the CFB fallen dynasties include OU’s bitter rival in Austin, with Texas going from having a win percentage of .875 under Mack Brown from 2001 to 2005 to the Longhorns’ current five-year percentage of .692 under Steve Sarkisian, representing a decline of .183, win percentage wise. In the Longhorns case, Sarkisian at least has the SEC newcomer on the rise, going from the days of Charlie Strong and his 16-21 (or .432) record and moving up to the program’s first two appearances in the CFP in 2023 and 2024, with the former Washington and USC head coach posting 25 wins in those two campaigns. (add context on Sark’s rise at UT – this makes it sound like he’s about to get fired)
Rounding out the ‘Fallen Dynasties’ list is a pair of Tigers, with Clemson in seventh place with a -.174 win percentage difference, followed by the Tigers of LSU (-.150), Alabama (-.064) and Ohio State (-.053), showing that slumps can happen anywhere in the FBS.
At Clemson, ‘failure’ is far too strong of a word to describe the way Dabo Swinney’s team has played of late, as the Tigers have four double-digit win seasons in the last half-decade, but have failed to make it past the first round of the CFP since losing the title game to LSU. While some would attribute much of the blame for Clemson’s lack of CFP success this decade to Swinney’s downright refusal to embrace the NCAA Transfer Portal, the fact remains that the Tigers’ recruiting has trailed off of late. That’s because 247 Sports’ recruiting class rankings show that the Tigers’ four-year average class rank of 14.5 from 2022 to 2025 falls well shy of where Swinney and company stood the previous four years, when Clemson had four straight top 10 classes with an average ranking of 6.25 nationally, potentially explaining Clemson’s lack of CFP success since winning it all in 2018.
Over in Tuscaloosa, the story’s much the same, with the Crimson Tide ‘sliding’ from a high water mark (win percentage wise) of .917 between 2015 and 2019 to .853 over the last five years, representing a decline of .064, though Alabama does have a title during that stretch (winning it all in 2020 and losing the title game in 2021).
Throw in the retirement of legendary head coach Nick Saban in January of 2024 and the to-be-determined fate of Saban’s replacement, Kalen DeBoer, and you have the recipe for a backslide at Alabama, though things could turn around quickly if DeBoer matches the level of success he achieved at Fresno State and Washington, where he went 18-12 (.667) and 25-3 (.893) in four seasons with the Bulldogs and Huskies.
The Crimson Tide’s divisional rivals from Baton Rouge have followed a similar arc, sliding from the program’s high (win percentage wise) of .785 to the Tigers’ current .635 mark from 2020 to 2024. Much of that slide is thanks to the fact that former LSU head coach Ed Orgeron failed to live up to the 15-0 standard set by the 2019 team that barnstormed the country, riding out consecutive .500 seasons in 2020 and 2021 before being fired and replaced by Kelly ahead of the 2022 season.
While things haven’t gone to plan in Western South Carolina of late, that’s not to say that Tigers head coach Dabo Swinney can’t turn things around, as Clemson reached the CFP a year ago and holds +1000 of winning the event for a third time this season.
That figure puts Clemson fifth nationally, behind other surveyed teams like Ohio State (1st at +500) and Texas (2nd at +550) and ahead of Alabama (+1200), LSU (+1800), Michigan (+2500, Florida and Miami (+4000 each), Oklahoma (+6500) and USC (+10000).
Looking forward, of the teams surveyed for this story, the Longhorns have the brightest future based solely on recruiting class rankings, with UT currently holding the top class nationally in 2025, with 25 commits overall and five, five-star recruits coming to Austin this fall.
Elsewhere, Georgia (No. 2 nationally), Alabama (No. 3), Ohio State (No. 4) Florida (No. 7), Auburn (No. 8), LSU (No. 10), USC (No. 13) Miami (No. 14), Oklahoma (No. 17), FSU (No. 19) and Clemson (No. 26) are a bit further down the 247 class rankings for 2025.
Of note among the group surveyed for this story is that Swinney and his staff have stayed steadfast in their resistance to the portal, with Clemson ranking 118th nationally on 247 Sports’ board when broken down by transfers only, with three players joining the Tigers roster, while eight players departed the ACC program via the portal this offseason.
USA Today photo by Ken Ruinard.
Author
Christopher Boan is a lead writer at BetCarolina.com specializing in covering state issues. He has covered sports and sports betting in Arizona for more than seven years, including stops at ArizonaSports.com, the Tucson Weekly and the Green Valley News.
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