Best in College Sports: Ohio State, L’ville, UCLA lead 2014-15 rankings – CBSSports.com

Dodd: Ohio State earns No. 1 spot | Norlander: Alford keeps UCLA relevant

Once again, the world of college athletics provided a wealth of excitement during the 2014-15 season.

Ohio State won the first College Football Playoff, capturing its first national title in the sport since 2002. Duke returned to the top of men’s basketball, ending a short four-year drought and winning the championship. Virginia catapulted itself to the top of the college baseball world, winning the national title one year after finishing as a runner-up to Vanderbilt.

So how did all FBS schools compare when it came to the major college sports? Once again, we sought to find out with our own custom formula.

The National Association of College Directors of Athletics (NACDA) has been ranking athletic programs for years but weighs every sport equally, meaning a football national title is worth the same number of points (100) as a women’s water polo title. The CBS Sports Best in College Sports award is weighed more heavily toward sports that generate the broadest base of fan and media interest. We rated five sports — football, men’s basketball, women’s basketball, baseball and a “wild card” sport.

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The wild-card spot went to the most successful among the school’s following spectator sports: softball, men’s lacrosse, men’s ice hockey, men’s soccer, wrestling, volleyball, women’s soccer or women’s gymnastics.

For our formula (which takes into account only schools that field FBS football programs): we weighed football with a triple value, while men’s basketball is worth twice as many points as the other sports that are part of the formula.

OSU received 300 points for winning the football national title (100 points times three). Oregon finished second in the AP Top 25 for football and was awarded 270 points. Football teams that finished with a winning record or went to a bowl game, but didn’t rank in the final AP poll, received 75 points (25 points times three). Teams that were bowl-eligible, but didn’t play in the postseason were awarded 30 points.

For all titles that were settled via a bracket, point totals were based on via how many teams filled out the bracket. Duke’s national title in men’s basketball was worth 200 points. Teams that made the NIT, CBI or CIT were given 20 points (10 points times two).

All champions in the other sports we surveyed received 100 points for a national title. — J. Darin Darst