Peak Maryland football.

Made me google their 1953. That was quite the era of college football with realignment.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Southern_Conference#SoCon_membership_timeline

I clearly care so much about east coast football history that I didn't know Bama/Georgia and Maryland were once in the same conference with like 20 members.

The schedule Maryland played in the first year of the ACC in 1953 was wild. Georgia, Miami, Ole Miss, Bama, and the George Washington Colonials Revolutionaries. Only 3 conference games in a 7 team conference.

Of all the schools which cycled through the Southern Conference over tim, which is every major school south of an imaginary line from Penn State to Arkansas (excluding FSU/Miami), Maryland is the only one which ended up in the Big 10.

People forget Bear Bryant’s first head coaching job was Maryland.