NEW ORLEANS — For all the Heisman Trophy winners and national championships that Ohio State, Texas and Southern California have combined to produce, those marquee football programs have never had one of their quarterbacks start a Super Bowl. The same is true for Oregon, Auburn and a host of other traditional powerhouses.

Delaware, however, which competes in the Football Championship Subdivision, has now produced two: Rich Gannon of the Oakland Raiders in Super Bowl XXXVII and Joe Flacco, who will start for Baltimore against San Francisco on Sunday. The only colleges to produce more are Notre Dame, Purdue, California and Alabama, each of which has had three. (Colin Kaepernick, the 49ers’ starter, went to Nevada, and will be that university’s first Super Bowl starter.)

Even outside of Super Bowl starts, Delaware, led for years by the Hall of Fame coach Tubby Raymond, has produced an almost staggering number of N.F.L. quarterbacks for a university that does not play in the Football Bowl Subdivision. Including Flacco and Gannon, Delaware has had five quarterbacks drafted by N.F.L. teams, and a sixth, Pat Devlin, signed as an undrafted free agent. While U.S.C. may have had a whopping 21 quarterbacks drafted over the years, Texas, for all its storied history, has had only six.

“I think it has a lot to do with being put in a situation with a little more freedom,” Scott Selheimer, Delaware’s sports information director, said of the team’s unusual success. “There’s also a certain amount of luck involved in ending up in the right situation.”