Editor’s note: As the World Cup continues in the United States for the first time since 1994, The Athletic is looking back at college sports in the 1990s and how much has changed since then. Join us for a couple of weeks of offseason football and basketball nostalgia.

The 1990s were a time for world-changing technological advances — welcome to the vernacular, “websites” and “email” — legendary art and an unforgettable era of college football.

Of course, some of society’s foremost ills in 2026 owe themselves to the World Wide Web. The ’90s gave us Kurt Cobain, Wu-Tang Clan and “Pulp Fiction,” but they also gave us Fred Durst, Insane Clown Posse and “Encino Man.” College football had some elements best left in the trash bin with the moth-eaten flannels as well.

Here are 10 things we don’t miss about the sport in the 1990s (check out 90 things we miss here).

1. Tie games. If only we could go back in time, armed with overtime rules (which debuted in 1996), and settle “The Choke at Doak” — Florida State scoring four touchdowns in the fourth quarter to turn a 31-3 deficit against rival Florida into a 31-31 final score. The last tie in college football history, in 1995, was a great one to go out on: Wisconsin 3, Illinois 3. Imagine having to sit through that grunt-fest and not even receiving an outcome. On short fields, one of them would have had to score.

2. Getting sick of arguing about which of the clear two best teams was better and wishing there was a way to get them on a field together. What would Marco Coleman and that fierce Bobby Ross-coached Georgia Tech defense in 1990 have done against Darian Hagan, Eric Bieniemy and the Bill McCartney “I-Bone” offense of Colorado? Could Miami’s Gino Torretta escape Washington’s Steve Emtman in 1991? What if 1993 Auburn wasn’t banned from the postseason? Penn State or Nebraska in 1994? Michigan or Nebraska in 1997? Arguing is a college football staple, but in some of these cases it was shared frustration that no mechanism existed to deliver the matchups everyone wanted to see.

3. The BCS computers. They didn’t truly infuriate the sport until 2000, when they favored Florida State heavily over Miami despite the Canes’ head-to-head win over the Seminoles. But they were ignored immediately at the end of their debut season in 1998, with No. 4 Ohio State and No. 8 Florida getting BCS bowl bids while No. 3 Kansas State was relegated to the Alamo Bowl. That prompted a quick rule change.

4. The growing realization that anonymous users with knowledge on message boards might be more bad than good. By the end of the decade, “doxxing” was added to the vernacular as well.

5. No instant replay available to fix clearly blown calls — and for anyone who wants to contest this and talk about delays, go back and watch a full 1990s game and be prepared to pull some of your hair out.

6. Vicious crackback blocks and other headhunting plays that were more about harming the opponent than football — same thing, go back and watch a full game from the era if you doubt this. You’ll be stunned by some of the plays that are treated as a normal part of the game.

7. Watching the money explode for the people in suits and wondering why any other college student with marketable talent could monetize it, yet the NCAA was trying to make sure these guys didn’t grab one too many strips of bacon at the training table. One more time: As chaotic as the sport may be right now, imagine going back to this world.

8. The intensifying of the “facilities arm race,” also known as “hiding the money.” All while U.S. News and World Report rankings got universities scrambling to impress and tuition skyrocketed across the land.

9. College football fans who equated NCAA rules to actual laws. And who considered the rival coach a borderline serial killer because of his blatant cheating, while declaring with certainty that “our coach has integrity.”

10. Cigarette smoke everywhere. Yes, this is more societal. But, goodness, those tailgates could get awfully stank.