How many national championships does Miami have? Hurricanes going for latest vs Indiana
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This season, the College Football Playoff semifinals featured a group of relative upstarts.
In a sport that hasn’t crowned a first-time national champion since 1996, three of the four remaining teams had never won a national title. There was Indiana, which had been the losingest program in FBS history until earlier this season before racking up a 15-0 record and a No. 1 ranking nationally. There was Oregon, which has become a national power over the past 25 years, but is still seeking that long-elusive first ring. There was Mississippi, which had won a program-record 13 games, the last two of which came with a new head coach.
Then there was Miami.
Though the Hurricanes have been barraged by questions for 20 years about whether they can ever return to national relevance, those concerns only exist because of the program’s decorated history.
“The U” is one of the most successful and influential programs in modern college football history, with a handful of national championships, two Heisman Trophy winners and a slew of All-America selections, many of whom went on to become NFL superstars and Pro Football Hall of Famers.
Miami’s run through the playoff this season has marked a return to that glorious past, with the Hurricanes now 60 minutes away from their first national title in a quarter century.
As coach Mario Cristobal’s team prepares for its matchup against No. 1 Indiana in the championship game of the College Football Playoff on Monday, Jan. 19, here’s a closer look at Miami’s title history:
How many national championships has Miami won?
Miami has won five national championships, all of which have come since the 1983 college football season. That mark ranks it in a tie for 11th among FBS programs. Its five national titles since 1983 are the second-most during that stretch, behind only Alabama.
The Hurricanes of the 1980s share some similarities to what Indiana has done under second-year Hoosiers head coach Curt Cignetti, with what had been a middling program quickly becoming a national powerhouse.
Former Miami coach Howard Schnellenberger inherited a program that went 14-29 in the four seasons before he was hired and guided it to a national championship in his fifth season. He was followed by Jimmy Johnson, who won another national championship in 1987 before moving on to the NFL. His successor, Dennis Erickson, won a pair of titles and after enduring NCAA sanctions in the 1990s, the program was rebuilt by Butch Davis, who paved the way for his replacement, Larry Coker, to win the 2001 national championship with a team widely regarded as one of the best in college football history.
Mario Cristobal, the team’s current head coach, was an offensive lineman on the 1989 and 1991 championship teams.
All five of the Hurricanes’ national championships came in a 19-season stretch from 1983-2001. No other program won more than three titles during that span.
Miami football national championships
Here’s a look at Miami’s national championship, along with the bowl result that helped them earn the title:
- 1983: Miami 31, Nebraska 30 (Orange Bowl)
- 1987: Miami 20, Oklahoma 14 (Orange Bowl)
- 1989: Miami 33, Alabama 25 (Sugar Bowl)
- 1991: Miami 22, Nebraska 0 (Orange Bowl)
- 2001: Miami 37, Nebraska 14 (BCS Championship Game)
When was Miami’s last national championship?
Miami’s last national championship came at the end of the 2001 season, when a team loaded with future NFL draft picks such as Ed Reed, Andre Johnson, Clinton Portis, Vince Wilfork, Jonathan Vilma and Jeremy Shockey blew out Nebraska 37-14 in the Rose Bowl (which served as that year’s BCS championship game).
The Hurricanes’ last appearance in a national championship game came the following season, when it lost 31-24 in overtime to Ohio State at the end of the 2002 season — a loss the Hurricanes, in a sense, avenged with a win over the defending champion Buckeyes in the 2025 Cotton Bowl.
This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Miami football national championships: How many have Hurricanes won?
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