Virginia Tech hired Frank Beamer in December 1986 to take over a football program rocked with scandal and on NCAA probation. After the 1992 season, many assumed the university administration would fire him when the Hokies finished the year with a 2-8-1 record. The ad-ministration was patient. Starting in 1993, the Virginia Tech football team set upon a path that would lead to the National Championship game of 1999 played on January 4, 2000, at the Sugar Bowl. This is the story of the games played between 1992 and that January night when, for a few minutes, Virginia Tech reached the pinnacle of the college football world. While Frank Beamer never won a national championship as coach, this book is about the teams that put Beamer and the Hokies in the stratosphere where dreams became goals, and the quest for those goals changed a university.

The result of 15 years of exhaustive research, this work is the definitive statistical and factual reference for everything related to college football in the past 50 years.

The most comprehensive reference book ever assembled on the history of college football From South Bend, Indiana, to Lincoln, Nebraska, Palo Alto, California, to Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Ann Arbor, Michigan, to Tallahassee, Florida, college football attracts the most dedicated fans in all of sports. This book is their Biblea rich and exhaustive reference guide to the games history, tradition, and lore. Based on three years of research by the nations foremost college football experts, the book features: lCapsule histories for each of the Division 1-A programs, the Ivy League schools, and the historically black colleges lYear-by-year schedules and scores for each school lStatistical leaders from each school lFight-song lyrics lBox scores for every bowl game ever played lWeekly AP and UPI polls dating back to 1936 lA four-color insert illustrating the evolution of each schools helmet design lEssays by the games top wordsmiths, including Dan Jenkins, Beano Cook, Chris Fowler, and more. lAnd a lively round-table discussion on the state of the game with ESPNs popular GameDay team (Fowler, Lee Corso, and Kirk Herbstreit). Packed with tables and charts and designed in an easy-to-read style, the ESPN College Football Encyclopedia is sure to dazzle even the most knowledgeable fan.

Features essays, player profiles, and statistics for the 1998 sports year, covering football, baseball, hockey, tennis, boxing, and other sports; and includes month-by-month event listings for 1999.

The most comprehensive resource on college football ever published.

Provides up-to-date facts, statistics, and information about all types of sports. Includes 2001 world series.