- Former Nebraska coach Tom Osborne revealed he voted for Georgia Tech over Colorado for the 1990 national championship.
- Osborne cited Colorado’s controversial fifth-down win against Missouri and Georgia Tech’s more decisive victory over his own team as reasons for his vote.
- The two teams will face each other for the first time in the 2025 season opener.
Nearly 35 years later, former Nebraska coach Tom Osborne finally is willing to talk about which team he voted to win the national championship for the 1990 college football season.
Did he select Big Eight Conference rival Colorado as the nation’s No. 1 team after the Buffaloes beat Notre Dame in the Orange Bowl on Jan. 1, 1991?
Or did he instead coronate Georgia Tech, which beat his Nebraska team that same day in the Citrus Bowl?
Osborne, 88, discussed it by phone with USA TODAY Sports as Colorado and coach Deion Sanders prepare to face Georgia Tech in a season-opening game in Boulder on Friday, Aug. 29. It will be the first meeting of Colorado and Georgia Tech despite forever being linked by what happened in the voting for that national championship.
“If you wanted to know how I voted, I did vote for Georgia Tech,” Osborne said.
Osborne was seen as an important vote because his team was the only one that played both teams in the 1990 season. He previously has declined to talk about it publicly, even though many speculated he voted Georgia Tech No. 1, perhaps even to deny league foe Colorado of a national championship prize that he had had yet to win.
Osborne denies he did it to spite Colorado. “I would never do that,” he said.
He had other reasons.
What happened with the Coaches Poll voting?
There was no College Football Playoff back then. The national championship instead was decided by voters in two main polls after teams played their postseason bowl games.
Their link to a shared national title serves as a reminder of how controversy and conflicts of interest could shape the sport back then in an age before replay review and rules to prevent such conflicts.
Something seemed especially strange about the Coaches Poll then because the balloting was secret and the winning margin in that poll was only one point (847-846), including a 30-27 margin in first-place votes for Georgia Tech.
The coaches’ voting then was tabulated by Jeff Shain, then the sports editor of United Press International (UPI), which sponsored the poll. Shain told USA TODAY Sports recently that after 58 ballots were counted in the final Coaches Poll on Jan. 2, 1991, Colorado and Georgia Tech were tied at No. 1 with one vote left to be tracked down. That 59th and final coach then voted for Georgia Tech to break the tie.
“That coach, unbeknownst to him, essentially swung the national title,” Shain said. “All 59 votes count the same, but because he was last, it was the determining ballot.”
Who was the final vote in the Coaches Poll?
Shain said it wasn’t Osborne. But because the margin was only one point, any coach who voted Georgia Tech No. 1 could have changed the result had he voted for Colorado instead.
Shain declined to say who cast the final vote, citing a confidentiality agreement with the coaches’ association back then.
He confirmed the ballots were required to be kept secret and then thrown away.
“Our procedure was to tally them and toss them,” Shain said.
By contrast, the final Associated Press poll wasn’t as close or controversial: It was 39-20 in first-place voting for Colorado over Georgia Tech. That poll of voters in the news media also had consistently kept Colorado No. 1 since November 1990 as the Buffaloes navigated one of the nation’s toughest schedules.
Swing in final voting for Georgia Tech
In a big shift, the Coaches Poll moved Georgia Tech into the No. 1 spot even though Colorado was in first in the previous poll in December 1990 and the Buffaloes beat No. 5 Notre Dame the day before, 10-9. It was the first time in that poll’s history that a No. 1 team fell out of the top spot after winning a bowl game.
This flipflop stunned then-Colorado coach Bill McCartney, who learned the results of the final UPI Coaches Poll after landing at the airport in Denver after the Orange Bowl, according to University of Colorado athletics historian Dave Plati
“That’s not right,” McCartney said then. “You call UPI back and tell them to have the coaches vote again.’
McCartney, who died in January, long suspected Osborne had ranked Georgia Tech No. 1. Plati said he never got confirmation of Osborne’s ballot.
“He would never come out and say where he voted us,” Plati said recently.
Why did Tom Osborne vote for Georgia Tech?
Coaches weren’t required to reveal their ballots in the final poll, unlike now in the US LBM Coaches Poll, administered by USA TODAY Sports.
The secrecy of the ballots and lack of confirmation from Osborne led to decades of rumors about how he voted and why.
Osborne told USA TODAY Sports he doesn’t remember where he voted Colorado on his final ballot or final regular-season ballot. He cited two big factors for his final vote. One was that Colorado had received an illegal fifth down to beat Missouri that season on the final play of the game, 33-31. Another was that Georgia Tech beat his Nebraska team more soundly than Colorado did (45-21 by Georgia Tech, 27-12 by Colorado).
“They were both good teams, and I think the distinguishing factor was Colorado ended up having five downs in one of their wins and Georgia Tech didn’t have any somewhat questionable finishes,” Osborne told USA TODAY Sports. “So I voted for Georgia Tech, and of course we played them both. I thought Georgia Tech at the end of the year was pretty good.”
Why was the Colorado fifth-down game an issue?
Colorado started the year 1-1-1, including a loss at Illinois and a tie against Tennessee in Anaheim, California, before finishing with 10 consecutive wins. But one of those wins came on that fifth down at Missouri.
It wasn’t Colorado’s fault, but the Buffs won on a final play that shouldn’t have been allowed.
The officiating crew and scoreboard indicated it was third down when quarterback Charles S. Johnson spiked the ball to stop the clock. It was really fourth down after Colorado had run three previous plays from the Missouri 3-yard line, including another spiked ball to stop the clock on first down. Missouri was set to win, 31-27, if the game ended there.
But if the quarterback had known it was really fourth down instead of third, he wouldn’t have spiked the ball to surrender the game on downs. He instead would have tried to win as he did on the next play − a 1-yard touchdown run on “fifth down” as time expired.
The confusion stemmed from when game officials had failed to change the down marker from “2” to “3” after 2-yard gain on second down.
Then-Missouri coach Bob Stull was a voter in the final poll back then, too. He told USA TODAY Sports he doesn’t remember how he voted. The Tigers were also Big Eight members with Nebraska and Colorado.
“I wasn’t bitter on the (fifth-down) thing, so I don’t know if it carried at all,” Stull said. “You’ve got your conference you’re trying to vote for too, you know. I can’t tell you how I did, but that wouldn’t have come into play for me.”
Major voting change in final Coaches Poll
In previous voting to end the regular season in December 1990, the Coaches Poll had Colorado ranked No. 1 by a margin of 38-7 over Georgia Tech in first-place votes – 45 points total out a panel of 59 coaches. That means 14 coaches didn’t vote in that previous poll.
But then in the final poll on Jan. 2, 1991, all 59 coaches voted, including 30 first-place votes for Georgia Tech, 27 for Colorado and two for Miami (Fla.).
Shain said sometimes some coaches were simply hard to track down for their ballots because they were on the road recruiting and didn’t have cell phones then.
“Voting is not high on their priority list,” he said.
Why did Colorado lose support in that poll?
Many coaches who voted back then have died or said they don’t remember how they voted. McCartney of Colorado voted his team No. 1 and Georgia Tech No. 2, according to Plati. Then-Georgia Tech coach Bobby Ross told USA TODAY Sports recently he also voted his own team No. 1.
In Colorado’s case, there were other issues – the fifth-down win and a controversial clipping penalty against Notre Dame that nullified a last-minute punt return for a touchdown in the Orange Bowl by the Fighting Irish. Add them both together and coaches might have felt Colorado didn’t deserve it.
Georgia Tech looked good in comparison. The Yellow Jackets finished the season undefeated with one tie against North Carolina, including wins against then-No. 1 Virginia and then-No. 13 Nebraska
Ross also brought up the fifth-down win by Colorado but said he didn’t remember where he voted the Buffs.
“Colorado won one game on a fifth down that was given to them,” Ross told USA TODAY Sports. “That was, to me, was another thing that would have worked against them. I know they were an outstanding team. I think we were too at that time.”
Poll conflicts and loyalty tests
In today’s game, members of the committee that vote for the 12 teams in the College Football Playoff are required to recuse themselves from voting if there is a conflict of interest, including if they work for the school in question.
But back then, these coaches decided part of the national title. And they not only voted for their own teams but also could possibly penalize others to their advantage in their secret balloting.
What was to stop Ross from putting Colorado a little further down his list than where he thought they belonged?
“I would have Colorado where I think they should have been,” Ross said.
We don’t know if Ross or any coach sought to influence the final result this way. We do know that at least one coach or possibly two voted Georgia Tech multiple places behind Colorado because the Yellow Jackets finished with three more first-place votes but only a one-point margin.
Others had reason to vote for teams in their own conference to enhance their league media exposure. Ironically, then-Nebraska athletic director Bob Devaney raised a stink about some Big Eight coaches voting Virginia No. 1 earlier in the 1990 season instead of Nebraska.
Osborne ultimately didn’t follow Devaney’s Big Eight loyalty beliefs, nor was he required to do so.
“Georgia Tech beat us by a bigger margin than Colorado, and then there was that little bit of a controversial thing with Colorado,” Osborne said. “So I thought I Georgia Tech deserved at that point to be No. 1. You make a judgment. That’s the basis of my judgment.”
Follow reporter Brent Schrotenboer @Schrotenboer. Email: bschrotenb@usatoday.com