re: College football programs that, while not elite, always seem to play fundamentally sound?

Biased, but Wisconsin is an immediate thought. They rank No. 8 nationally in wins over the last five years, No. 7 in the last decade and No. 6 in the last 15 seasons.

Since Paul Chryst became coach, the Badgers have come within the CFP a couple times, but get stopped in their tracks by Ohio State. Not surprising, but that's the next step for this program to go from good to elite. Not sure when that'll be, though... Ohio State is a machine in the B1G.

Dave Aranda brought the 3-4 to Wisconsin in 2013. In those eight years, Wisconsin has finished outside Top-10 in Total Defense just once. They've really figured out how to keep that train rolling between Aranda, Justin Wilcox and Jim Leonhard.

In all, Wisconsin will always fight an uphill battle. They're in a solid, well short of great recruiting footprint that is dominated by Michigan, Notre Dame and Ohio State. Because of that, and no other in-state Division I program, they are predicated on developing players over four and five years.

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College football programs that, while not elite, always seem to play fundamentally sound?

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If that’s not a dog whistle for Midwest teams with higher percentages of white players I don’t know what is.

Oh I do too, but in this instance it’s used correctly.

I have never thought of Maryland as solid and fundamentally sound.

Sounds like you haven’t watched many Maryland football games throughout the years.

Have they ever actually been good? All I can remember is them getting their shite pushed in in the ACC, the. Switching over to getting their shite pushed in in the B1G.

A good under the radar pick is Wyoming. Bohl always has them ready to play and they don't often beat themselves.

insert Midwest team with a bunch of white dudes

Both BYU and Utah seem to punch above their weight by not beating themselves.

Arkansas under Nutt always seemed to have good line play but big deficiencies in other areas.

Maryland isn't fundamentally sound at all. In fact their coaching and attention to detail has been bad for a while.

Same with Penn State under Franklin. Sloppy play, blowing big leads, stupid penalties, etc. It's a far cry from the Joe Pa days where they always played smart football.