21 - Pittsburgh

There are few college programs that can boast the name recognition and football personalities of the University of Pittsburgh.

Mike Ditka, Tony Dorsett, Dan Marino, Hugh Green, Johnny Majors, Mark May, Joe Schmidt and Marshall Goldberg.

Or, more recently, Curtis Brown, Ruben Brown, Bill Maas, Tony Siragusa, Marty Schottenheimer, Bill Fralic, Larry Fitzgerald, Antonio Bryant and current coach Dave Wannstedt, who was a graduate assistant in 1975-76.

“We were in a staff meeting and I’m sitting at the far end of the table -- it was the ’76 year, the year we won the national championship -- and I think my job that day was to make the coffee," Wannstedt said. “I’m looking at Coach Majors and I said to myself, 'Someday I will be the head coach at the University of Pittsburgh.’"

In the Tuscaloosa News’ Best College Football Ranking, which will list the Top 25 programs throughout the summer, the Pitt Panthers scored points in four categories, three of which were due to their proud tradition.

Pitt claims nine overall national championships, including consensus titles in 1937 and 1976. The latter came after a 27-3 dominating performance against Georgia in the first Sugar Bowl played in the Superdome (The Panthers’ defense caught more pass attempts by the Bulldogs, four, than the Georgia receivers, three).

From 1890 to 1990, Pitt was considered one of the country’s strongest independents until the Panthers became a charter member of the Big East in 1991.

The coaching legacy includes both Glenn “Pop" Warner (1915-23) and “Jock" Sutherland (1924-38), who had a winning percentage of .818 and guided Pitt to four Rose Bowls.

Dancer/actor Gene Kelly also went to Pittsburgh but never showed the kind of footwork Dorsett did at Pitt Stadium (The team recently started playing games at Heinz Field).

Not only is Dorsett the school’s lone Heisman Trophy winner (1976), but he and Marcus Allen are the only people with resumes that include college and Super Bowl championships, and inductions into both the college and pro football halls of fame.

“I look at him with a football, and it’s about as beautiful as football is ever supposed to look," coach Joe Paterno of rival Penn State said about Dorsett. “I think that’s part of why it’s hard to tackle him. He’s so elegant, it would be like tackling Fred Astaire."

Reach Christopher Walsh at christopher.walsh@tuscaloosanews.com or at (205) 722-0196.