By Patrick Stevens The Washington Times - October 3, 2008, 05:05PM

First of all, it’s wonderful to be able to make charts and insert links and copy-and-paste text again. So a hearty “thank you” or “gracias” or “merci beaucoup” or whatever to whoever fixed that

And with that power back in my hands, of course it’s time to make a chart.

SEE RELATED:

This one centers around Maryland’s mini-drought with regard to the AP poll. The Terrapins haven’t been ranked since the Nov. 12, 2006, poll before dropping out with a lopsided loss at Boston College.

But they’re just on the outskirts of a ranking this week, so it would be little surprise if Maryland made an appearance in the top 25 if it can win at Virginia tomorrow.

Now, this post is not meant to be presumptuous, but rather to show what sort of company Maryland is keeping in the poll-less since mid-November 2006 crowd.

So here is Maryland and the 19 other BCS conference schools that have droughts of at least 26 polls (with an assist from the fine people at appollarchive.com.

SchoolWeeksLast ranking
Maryland26Nov. 12, 2006
Washington State28Oct. 29, 2006
Iowa31Oct. 8, 2006
Miami35Sept. 10, 2006
Northwestern43Nov. 6, 2005
Colorado43Nov. 6, 2005
Michigan State
46Oct. 16, 2005
Minnesota47Oct. 9, 2005
Iowa State
49Sept. 25, 2005
Mississippi70Final – 2003
Washington81Sept. 28, 2003
N.C. State
84Sept. 7, 2003
Syracuse105Final – 2001
Stanford105Final – 2001
North Carolina
112Oct. 28, 2001
Mississippi State
117Sept. 23, 2001
Arizona129Oct. 22, 2000
Duke226Dec. 6, 1994
Indiana237Sept. 20, 1994
Baylor256Sept. 7, 1993

So, what to make of these numbers, besides the fact the bottom three schools are fairly predictable.

Well, the breakdown by conference of these 20 schools is as follows: ACC (5), Big Ten (5), Pac-10 (4), Big 12 (3), SEC (2), Big East (1).

The only schools that haven’t had coaching changes since their last poll appearance are Iowa and Maryland.

Maryland, Michigan State, Northwestern, North Carolina and Mississippi, by the way, all received votes in this week’s poll.

Colorado, Miami and Washington are the only schools on the list to at least share a football national championship in the last 20 years.

None of these schools is anywhere near the longest active drought of a major-college team. That honor belongs to Louisiana-Lafayette, which is 916 polls removed from a Nov. 1, 1943, appearances.

– Patrick Stevens