Ranking the Top 131 College Football Programs of the Last 40 Years: 108. Rice
Best served as a side dish
Starting off as a football program in 1912, Rice was a regional and national power for the better part of half a century. However, by the 1960’s, Rice began to struggle to keep up with the bigger universities, and had just 1 winning season from 1964-1991, finishing as high as 3rd in the SWC just once. Since then, they’ve had more success, with their top 12 seasons since 1983 all being after 1991, while 4 of their worst 8 seasons are from 1984-88.
President Kennedy used Rice Stadium for his 1962 “We choose to go to the Moon” speech, using the Rice football team as inspiration: "But why, some say, the Moon? Why choose this as our goal? And they may well ask why climb the highest mountain? Why, 35 years ago, fly the Atlantic? Why does Rice play Texas? We choose to go to the Moon. We choose to go to the Moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too."
Best Seasons and Highlights
+------+------+------+--------------+--------+
| rank | team | year | resume score | record |
+------+------+------+--------------+--------+
| 32 | Rice | 2008 | 12.093 | 10-3 |
| 47 | Rice | 2013 | 2.982 | 10-4 |
| 49 | Rice | 1997 | -1.948 | 7-4 |
| 39 | Rice | 1996 | -2.301 | 7-4 |
| 50 | Rice | 2001 | -2.644 | 8-4 |
| 49 | Rice | 1992 | -6.588 | 6-5 |
| 66 | Rice | 2014 | -9.809 | 8-5 |
| 69 | Rice | 2020 | -10.257 | 2-3 |
| 58 | Rice | 1994 | -11.059 | 5-6 |
| 71 | Rice | 2012 | -12.228 | 7-6 |
| 55 | Rice | 1993 | -12.292 | 6-5 |
| 61 | Rice | 1998 | -13.32 | 5-6 |
| 62 | Rice | 1990 | -14.613 | 5-6 |
| 70 | Rice | 1999 | -14.958 | 5-6 |
| 69 | Rice | 2006 | -15.123 | 7-6 |
| 81 | Rice | 2003 | -24.076 | 5-7 |
| 73 | Rice | 1991 | -24.446 | 4-7 |
| 93 | Rice | 2011 | -28.35 | 4-8 |
| 83 | Rice | 2002 | -29.538 | 4-7 |
| 81 | Rice | 1986 | -31.124 | 4-7 |
| 98 | Rice | 2015 | -32.255 | 5-7 |
| 83 | Rice | 1985 | -32.392 | 3-8 |
| 87 | Rice | 1995 | -34.238 | 2-8-1 |
| 113 | Rice | 2022 | -34.482 | 5-8 |
| 84 | Rice | 1989 | -35.177 | 2-8-1 |
| 106 | Rice | 2021 | -35.833 | 4-8 |
| 98 | Rice | 2010 | -35.875 | 4-8 |
| 93 | Rice | 2000 | -36.628 | 3-8 |
| 100 | Rice | 2004 | -37.697 | 3-8 |
| 116 | Rice | 2019 | -38.947 | 3-9 |
| 103 | Rice | 2007 | -42.963 | 3-9 |
| 121 | Rice | 2016 | -46.095 | 3-9 |
| 97 | Rice | 1987 | -47.271 | 2-9 |
| 102 | Rice | 1984 | -54.05 | 1-10 |
| 114 | Rice | 2005 | -55.283 | 1-10 |
| 115 | Rice | 2009 | -58.148 | 2-10 |
| 104 | Rice | 1983 | -59.301 | 1-10 |
| 127 | Rice | 2018 | -59.963 | 2-11 |
| 100 | Rice | 1988 | -60.13 | 0-11 |
| 128 | Rice | 2017 | -63.537 | 1-11 |
+------+------+------+--------------+--------+
Overall Score: 1757 (108th)169-289-2 record
2 conference titles
3-3 bowl record
1 consensus All-American
16 NFL players drafted
One of Rice’s conference titles came all the way back in 1994…when they finished just 5-6. Because 1st place Texas A&M was under sanctions, the SWC title was split 5 ways between Baylor, Rice, Texas, TCU, and Texas Tech. Huzzah! The other was in 2013, which we’ll look at more closely. RB Trevor Cobb is the only consensus All-American, running for 1692 yards and 14 TD in 1991 for a 4-7 Rice team.
Top 5 Seasons
Worst Season: 2017 (1-11 overall, 1-7 Conference USA)
Rice finished 128th in my rankings this year, with their only win over UTEP, who was somehow worse at 0-12. Despite the poor season, DL Brian Womac had 10 sacks and 11 TFL, while LB Emmanuel Ellerbee led the team in tackles with 95, and both were 1st team All-CUSA. Worst losses included 7-62 to #14 Stanford in Australia, 3-38 to rival Houston, 12-49 to Army, and 21-52 to UAB. QBs Jackson Tyner, Miklo Smalls, and Sam Glaesmann did all they could, combining for 49.6% for 1721 yards 6 TD 16 INT. Smalls was at least a decent runner, adding 308 yards and 3 TD on the ground. Overall—very bad team, and gets the nod for worst team over 1988 because the win over UTEP was inconsequential.
5. 2001 (8-4 overall, 5-3 WAC)
Coach Ken Hatfield was in his 8th season with the team, the former 1983 Coach of the Year who won the award after finishing #13 in the country with Air Force, before going on to coach at Arkansas and Clemson. They started very strong at 6-1 (3-0 WAC), the only loss coming to a Nebraska team that would play for the national title later that year. Matched up with Louisiana Tech (3-3, 3-0) in a battle for 1st place in the WAC, LT would take it 41-38 in OT, and finish the season in 1st place at 7-5 (7-1 in the WAC). After a blowout loss to Fresno State, Rice had themselves quite the night at their homecoming against Tulsa, winning 59-32 and setting the record for points scored in a conference game with 59 and yards with 653. A win over UTEP moved Rice to 8-3 and a perfect 5-0 home record, the best in the 51 years played at Rice Stadium. A loss to SMU closed out the year. Sophomore QB Kyle Herm ran the option to perfection all year long, throwing for 1121 yards 8 TD 2 INT with 897 rushing yards and 11 TD. 6 players had 290+ rushing yards as the Owls ranked 2nd in the nation in rushing behind Nebraska.
4. 1996 (7-4 overall, 6-2 WAC)
Coach Hatfield’s 3rd year with the Owls. It was an…up and down year, to say the least. Big wins and big losses. The 4 losses were 7-70 to eventual #2 Ohio State, 0-49 to eventual #5 BYU, 7-34 to eventual #17 Kansas State, and 17-45 to Air Force. Why are they the 4th best Rice team since 1983 then? Besides Rice not having many great years? Well, their 51-10 win over #20 Utah is carrying a big load. Utah was 7-1 facing 4-3 Rice, and Rice blew the doors off the Utes, who at the time had defensive coordinator Kyle Whittingham in just his 2nd season. Rice was 7-1 against teams that didn’t finish in the top 25, so their strength of schedule didn’t hurt them too much in my algorithm, and they finished ranked #39 overall. Hatfield ran the option HARD this year, averaging just 47 pass YPG while rushing for 305 YPG. The team’s leading receiver was WR Thad Bridges, who had a whopping 15 catches for 103 yards and 0 TD. Kicking/punting were total opposites of each other, with the kickers going just 5/14 on FGs while punter Tucker Phillips boomed 45.9 yards per attempt on 53 punts.
3. 1997 (7-4 overall, 5-3 WAC)
Rice was coming off their best year since 1963 and topped it. The losses were worse than 1996, but the wins were so much better. In the season opener, Rice was randomly blown out by Air Force for the 2nd season in a row. Rice would bounce back in a big way, though. A 30-24 win over (eventual) 7-4 Tulane was topped next week with a 40-34 upset of Northwestern! Northwestern was just 2 years removed from a Rose Bowl appearance, was coming off a 9-3 season, and had beaten Oklahoma 24-0 in their season opener. A 31-38 loss to Texas the next week showed Rice was not to be messed with. 3 straight wins afterward included 27-14 over #21 BYU and 35-23 over (eventual 9-4) New Mexico. While Rice was in the driver’s seat for the division, they’d win just 2 of their last 4 to finish 7-4 and 2nd in the WAC Mountain Division, also missing a bowl. Hatfield continued to run the option with success, averaging 333 rushing YPG. QB Chad Nelson had 953 rushing yards and 7 TD, RB Benji Wood had 936 yards and 16 TD, and RB Michael Perry had 1034 yards and 10 TD.
2. 2013 (10-4 overall, 7-1 Conference USA)
And finally we get to the seasons you can ACTUALLY point to real accomplishments for. The only exposure most people probably had with this team was when Johnny Manziel beat them in the second half of the season opener, after being suspended for the first 30 minutes. Rice actually had a crazy year, though. The next week they beat Kansas 23-14, and entered conference play at 1-2. They had a flair for the dramatic: down 14-6 to FAU with 4 minutes left, they got a fumble return for TD to make it 14-12, missed the 2pt conversion, then scored the winning rushing TD 30 seconds later to win 18-14. Next week, they gave up a 24-10 4th quarter lead to Tulsa before winning 30-27 in OT. A few weeks later they were 7-3 (5-1 C-USA), and gave up a 31-21 lead with 7 minutes left before winning 37-34 in OT against UAB. FINALLY, they beat Tulane 17-13 to determine who’d go to the C-USA title game. Rice had made it at 9-3, after all that.
They had a much easier time in the championship game than in the regular season, dominating Marshall 41-24 at home to win their first outright conference championship since 1957! I’m not really sure what happened in the bowl, but after going up 7-0 on Mississippi State, they lost 7-44 and were outgained 145-533 in yardage. Yikes. Still, an amazing year for Rice, winning the conference championship in a season which featured a really strong Marshall with QB Rakeem Cato, really strong East Carolina with QB Shane Carden, and a 9-4 North Texas who had their best season of their 40 from 1983-2022. Future NFL players included 3rd round DB Phillip Gaines and K Chris Boswell.
1. 2008 (10-3 overall, 7-1 Conference USA)
The 2008 Rice team is probably one of the more interesting ones you never knew about. I’m going to focus more on the individual players than the on-field results, but they were a REALLY fun team, going 10-3 with 41.3 PPG, while giving up 33.3 PPG. They had 42-35, 45-40, and 56-42 wins over bowl teams Memphis, Southern Miss, and Houston, respectively, and capped off the season with a 38-14 win over 9-3 Western Michigan. But the personnel on this team is where the fun is.
QB Chase Clement finished his outstanding career with a MONSTER year, completing 67% of passes for 4119 yards 44 TD and just 7 INT. He also ran for 693 yards and 12 TD for a total of 57 TD (1 receiving) in just 13 games! WR Jarrett Dillard was voted an All-American by FWAA, SI, Walter Camp, AP, SN, and ESPN, and set the NCAA record for career receiving TD with 60. He had a whopping 87 catches for 1310 yards and 20 TD! He was just 5’10, but able to snag jump balls with his 43” vertical.
TE James Casey earned 3rd Team All-American, setting NCAA records for a TE with 111 catches for 1329 receiving yards, while also adding 13 TD. Casey was drafted by the Chicago White Sox in the 2003 MLB draft, and spent 3 years with them before joining Rice for football in 2007. In his freshman year, he played 7 different positions in a game against Southern Miss, and was listed as a QB on the roster. That year he had 46 catches for 585 yards and 4 TD, ran the ball 45 times for 121 yards and 5 TD, had 1 punt return, threw 7 passes, and had 3 tackles.
12 year NFL veteran S Andrew Sendejo led the team in tackles with 94 and INTs with 3. Future Houston and Texas HC Tom Herman was Rice’s offensive coordinator, which explains the high powered offense. Dillard and Casey were drafted in the 5th round after the season, DEs Cheta Ozougwu and Scott Scolomon went in the 7th rounds a few years later, and Sendejo went undrafted. Really fun team.
5th Quarter
What’d you think of the numbers on the 2008 Rice team? Does Rice as a program deserve to be ranked above fellow former C-USA members Tulane and UAB on this list?
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