What year did your team have a top-tier championship-caliber squad that somehow put themselves in too a deep a hole to compete for a Natty?

For us the first team that comes to mind is easily the 2015 team. That team should've been in the CFP but Meyer drawing up the worst gameplan I've ever fucking seen against Michigan State (let's not give Zeke the ball in a monsoon, they'll never see it coming) screwed us and left us stranded in a meaningless consolation prize bowl game instead.

Second team that comes to mind is the 2005 squad. On paper that was probably Tressel's most talented and complete team ever at Ohio State (had the dominant trio of Hawk, Schlegel, and Carpenter at LB, an emerging Troy Smith at QB, and Mangold at center not to mention Santonio Holmes, Ted Ginn, and Anthony Gonzalez at WR) but they didn't start to peak until towards the end of the year and had two costly losses to Texas and Penn State because Tressel spent a little too much time dicking around with the QB position early in the year. In contrast to that team the 2006 squad had problems on defense and the 2007 team was limited by having Todd Boeckman at QB.