1933 college football season The 1933 college football season saw the Michigan Wolverines repeat as winners of the Knute Rockne Memorial Trophy as national champion under the Dickinson system . Thirteen members of the old Southern Conference split off in 1933 to form the Southeastern Conference ( SEC ) . The ten Southern teams that remained behind would later ( 1953 ) constitute the Atlantic Coast Conference ( ACC ) . Other major conferences that existed in 1933 were the Western Conference ( today ' s Big Ten ) , the Pacific Coast Conference ( now the Pac - 10 ) , the Big Six ( later the Big 8 ) and the Southwest Conference , many of whom would later make up the Big Twelve . After several years of matching two of the nation ' s best teams against each other in an unofficial East - West championship game , the Rose Bowl matchup was less than spectacular . Stanford ( 8 - 1 - 1 ) was ranked behind USC by Dickinson , and Columbia ( 7 - 1 - 0 ) was not ranked at all . The Columbia Lions won the Pasadena game 7 - 0 . September . September 23 USC opened its season with a doubleheader against Occidental College , and Whittier College . Using a combination of varsity and reserves , the Trojans won 39 - 0 and 51 - 0 , respectively . Although future President Richard M . Nixon had been on the freshman football team at Whittier , he was not part of the varsity squad that played against USC . Oregon defeated Linfield College 53 - 0 . Stanford beat San Jose State 27 - 0 September 30 Stanford narrowly defeated UCLA 3 - 0 , USC beat Loyola Marymount 18 - 0 , and Oregon won at Gonzaga 14 - 0 . Army opened with a 19 - 6 win over Mercer College . Minnesota beat visiting South Dakota State 19 - 6 . Pittsburgh beat Washington & Jefferson 9 - 0 . October . October 7 USC defeated Washington State 33 - 0 , Stanford beat Santa Clara 7 - 0 , and Oregon got past Portland College 14 - 7 . Minnesota and Indiana tied 6 - 6 . Michigan ( whose team included Gerald Ford as a center ) beat Michigan State 20 - 6 , Purdue beat Ohio University 13 - 6 , and Ohio State rolled over Virginia 75 - 0 . Army beat Virginia Military Institute ( VMI ) 32 - 0 Pittsburgh beat West Virginia 21 - 0 . Nebraska beat visiting Texas 26 - 0 . Princeton opened its season with a shutout ( 40 - 0 ) over Amherst . October 14 In Minneapolis , Minnesota and Purdue played to a 7 - 7 tie . In Chicago , Stanford and Northwestern played to a 0 - 0 tie . Oregon won at Washington 6 - 0 , and USC beat St . Mary ' s 14 - 7 . Army defeated Delaware 52 - 0 and Pittsburgh beat Navy 34 - 6 . Ohio State defeated Vanderbilt 20 - 0 . Michigan beat Cornell 40 - 0 . Nebraska won at Iowa State 20 - 0 . Princeton recorded its second shutout , a 45 - 0 win over Williams . Tennessee suffered its first defeat since 1930 , losing 10 - 2 against Duke . October 21 Michigan beat visiting Ohio State 13 - 0 . Minnesota ( 1 - 0 - 2 ) hosted Pittsburgh ( 3 - 0 - 0 ) , with the home team Gophers winning , 7 - 3 . Purdue won at Chicago 14 - 0 . In Portland , USC and Oregon State played to a 0 - 0 tie . Stanford won at the University of San Francisco , 20 - 13 . In Cleveland Army beat Illinois 6 - 0 . Nebraska won at Kansas State 9 - 0 . Oregon beat Idaho 19 - 0 in a Friday Night game . Princeton beat Columbia , 20 - 0 , to stay unscored upon . October 28 USC narrowly won at California , 6 - 3 , Oregon won at UCLA 7 - 0 , and Stanford lost at Washington 6 - 0 . Michigan won at Chicago 28 - 0 , Ohio State beat Northwestern 12 - 0 , Minnesota beat Iowa 19 - 7 , and Purdue won at Wisconsin 14 - 0 . Army won at Yale 21 - 0 . Pittsburgh won at Notre Dame 14 - 0 . Nebraska beat Oklahoma 16 - 7 . Princeton narrowly won , but stayed unscored upon , with a 6 - 0 win over Washington & Lee . November . November 4 Oregon beat Utah 26 - 7 . Stanford beat the Olympic Club 21 - 0 and Army beat Coe College 34 - 0 . Purdue beat Carnegie Tech 17 - 7 . Michigan won at Illinois , 7 - 6 , Ohio State beat Indiana 21 - 0 . Minnesota and Northwestern played to a 0 - 0 tie . Pittsburgh beat Centre College 37 - 0 . Nebraska stayed unbeaten with a 26 - 0 win over Missouri . Princeton extended its shutout streat to five with a 33 - 0 win at Brown . November 11 In Los Angeles , USC ( 6 - 0 - 1 ) hosted Stanford ( 5 - 1 - 1 ) . The Trojans suffered their first defeat in 27 games , losing 13 - 7 , in a game that ultimately decided the Pacific Coast championship . Michigan defeated Iowa 5 - 3 . At Portland , Oregon beat Oregon State , 13 - 3 to extend its record to 8 - 0 - 0 . Army won at Harvard 27 - 0 . In Phildadelphia , Ohio State beat Penn 20 - 7 and Purdue won at Notre Dame 19 - 0 . Pittsburgh beat Duquesne 7 - 0 and Nebraska defeated Kansas 12 - 0 Princeton beat Dartmouth , 7 - 0 , for its sixth straight shutout . November 18 USC ( 7 - 0 - 1 ) handed visiting Oregon ( 8 - 0 - 0 ) its first defeat , 26 - 0 . Michigan ( 6 - 0 - 0 ) and Minnesota ( 3 - 0 - 3 ) , both unbeaten , played to a scoreless tie . Pittsburgh ( 6 - 1 - 0 ) hosted Nebraska ( 5 - 0 - 0 ) and won 6 - 0 . Princeton beat visiting Navy 13 - 0 . In seven games , it had outscored its opponents 164 - 0 . Stanford beat Montana 33 - 7 . Army defeated Pennsylvania Military Institute , 12 - 0 . Ohio State won at Wisconsin 6 - 0 . Purdue suffered its first loss of the season , falling 14 - 6 to visiting Iowa . November 25 Princeton was finally scored upon , after holding its first seven opponents scoreless . The streak was broken by Rutgers , which lost 26 - 6 . USC won at Notre Dame , 19 - 0 and Stanford beat California 7 - 3 . The annual Army – Navy Game took place in Philadelphia , and Army won 12 - 7 . Ohio State closed its season with a 7 - 6 win over Illinois and Michigan won at Northwestern 13 - 0 , Minnesota beat Wisconsin 6 - 3 , and Purdue won at Indiana 19 - 3 . Nebraska beat Iowa 7 - 6 Thanksgiving Day fell on November 30 in 1933 . Nebraska defeated Oregon State 22 - 0 to close its season at 8 - 1 - 0 . Oregon won at St . Mary ' s , 13 - 7 . Pittsburgh beat Carnegie Tech 16 - 0 . December . December 2 In Los Angeles , USC ( 8 - 1 - 1 ) hosted Georgia ( 8 - 1 - 0 ) and won 31 - 0 Army ( 9 - 0 - 0 ) and Notre Dame ( 2 - 5 - 1 ) met at Yankee Stadium . The Fighting Irish pulled off a 13 - 12 upset . Princeton , no longer having to maintain a streak of shutouts , won at Yale 27 - 2 to finish as the nation ' s only unbeaten and untied team . Conference standings . The following is an incomplete list of conference standings : Dickinson System . The AP sportswriters ' poll would not begin continuously until 1936 . ( although , the first time was a one instance publishing in 1934 ) Frank G . Dickinson , an economics professor at the University of Illinois , had invented the Dickinson System to rank colleges based upon their records and the strength of their opposition . The system was originally designed to rank teams in the Big Nine ( later the Big Ten ) conference . Chicago clothing manufacturer Jack Rissman then persuaded Dickinson to rank the nation ' s teams under the system , and the Rockne Memorial Trophy was awarded to the winning university . In an AP story with the caption " Figure This Out ! " , the system was explained : " For each victory of a first division team over another first division team , the winner gets 30 points and the loser 15 points . For each tie between two first division teams , each team gets 12 . 5 points . For each victory of a first division team over a second division team , the first division winner gets 20 points and the second division loser 10 points . For each tie between two second division teams , each gets 15 points . For each tie between a nr » t division team and a second division team , the first ivision team gets 15 points and the second dhision team gets 20 points . Then , after each team has been given its quota of points its final " score " is tabulated by taking an average on the number of games played . " Final Dickinson rankings . Michigan ( 7 - 0 - 1 ) , Minnesota ( 4 - 0 - 4 ) and Princeton ( 9 - 0 - 0 ) were all unbeaten , and Princeton was untied as well . Based on its schedule , Michigan was ranked highest by Professor Dickinson . As in 1933 , Dickinson ( an economics professor at the University of Illinois ) included four " Big Ten " colleges among the best in the nation . In 1933 , they were Michigan , Minnesota , Ohio State and Purdue . 1934 Rose Bowl . The Columbia Lions defeated the Stanford Indians ( now Cardinal ) 7 - 0 . Cliff Montgomery , the Columbia quarterback , was named the Rose Bowl Player Of The Game when the award was created in 1953 and selections were made retroactively . At 35 , 000 , it has the lowest attendance in the Rose Bowl game since the Rose Bowl Stadium was built in 1922 . This was one of the few rainy New Year ' s Day celebrations in Pasadena , California . Rain three days before had turned the Rose Bowl stadium into a small lake .