Posts tagged Georgia Tech

Any endeavor to rank the Southeastern Conferences rivalries in football is surely doomed from the start. There are generational issues and provincial issues that factor into every fans perspective.

Take for example the Ole Miss – LSU rivalry. If you live in the eastern part of the conference and are younger than 50, you probably don’t appreciate the magnitude of this rivalry. Ole Miss really has not been much of a power in recent decades. This has not always been true. John Howard Vaught won shares of three national titles for Ole Miss. My generation doesn’t pay the Ole Miss tradition the respect it deserves.

As important as the Georgia – Florida game means to me, its historical relevance to college football is more about the “World’s Largest Cocktail Party” and one game in 1980. Aside from Steve Spurrier’s squads in the mid 60′s and a few NCAA rule challenged teams in the 80′s, Florida’s football tradition begins in 1990.

Perhaps the best rivalry in the SEC has little to do with the quality of competition and more to do with the fans’ hatred for each other. Auburn and Alabama’s fans have elevated the “Iron Bowl” to the upper echelons of rivalries. The Auburn football team has done little, when compared to Alabama, to achieve this status. The Auburn fans have made the game special.

Georgia – Georgia Tech was a SEC rivalry for 31 (or 32) contests. Since they have played 45 times since Tech bolted the SEC, I will not consider this a SEC game. Tulane, Sewanee, Arkansas and South Carolina are also not being considered due to the brief histories in the SEC.

Having provided a little background on what is going into my ranking process, and trying to keep my UGA loyalties in check, I will now attempt to rank the top 5 SEC rivalries.

1. They call it “The Third Saturday in October” for its tradition spot on the football calendar. The game features two of the most prominent football programs and passionate fan bases in the history of the game. With 19 claimed National Championships and 42 SEC Championships between the two schools it doesn’t get any better than this.

Two of the games greatest coaches, Alabama’s Bear Bryant and Tennessee’s General Neyland add to the rich heritage of this must see rivalry. Both teams have embraced the tradition of handing out cigars following a victory. The rivalry has produced many long winning streaks, mostly for Alabama.

When the SEC expanded and established divisional play, Tennessee and Alabama were named permanent rivals, ensuring this great game would continue to be played annually. The divisinoal break up did alter scheduling for a few years forcing the game to move from its traditional third Saturday in October placement. the conference has adjusted, placing this game where it rightfully belongs.

Alabama leads the series 47-38-7 with multiple re-writes of the record books due to NCAA sanction against Alabama.

2. The “Iron Bowl” gets its name from the Birmingham legacy of steel mills.  The game is proably more about the fans interactions with each other throughout the year than anything that ever happens on the field. The majority of Auburn’s historical highlights in the series have been in the role of spoiler to Alabama’s title hunts. Only in relatively recent years has Auburn been a consistently competitive SEC power.

The game was not played for several years due to bickering between the schools. Everything has been brought into question. Auburn complained about the formations and shifts being utilized by Coach “Doc” Pollard in the early 1900′s. Auburn complained about the expenses their players were being played and neither team could agree on who would officiate the contests. Finally in 1907 the series was canceled.

The series would not resume until after the Alabama House of Representatives passed a resolution encouraging the schools to resume the game. In 1948 the school presidents agreed and the game was to be permanently played at Birmingham’s Legion Field, the largest stadium in the state, and the tickets would be distributed evenly between the two schools. With significant expansions to stadiums on both campuses the game is now played as a home and home series.

It is said upon one’s birth, or arrival, in the State of Alabama they must declare their allegiance to one, and only one, of the schools. I think they mean it.

Alabama leads the series 40-33-1.

3. The Deep South’s Oldest Rivalry South is not only the longest running rivalry in Dixie, it is also the most competitive. Auburn leads the series 53-52-8. Georgia leads the series accumulative score 1,778-1,722. That is a per-game average of 15.73-15.24. Talk about close.

This game is currently played as a home and home series. That was not always the case. The game was played several years, including the first meeting, in Atlanta’s Piedmont Park. After stops in Savannah, Macon and Montgomery, the game settled in the border town of Columbus, GA where it was played from 1920 until 1958 before the current arrangement took shape. Upon the division split, the SEC named Auburn and Georgia permanent rivals.

Georgia won the National Championship in 1942, its only blemish was a 27-13 loss to Auburn in Columbus. Georgia was the first Auburn rival that agreed to play a football game in the Loveliest Village on the Plains. The first time Georgia wore its now imfamous black jerseys was against Auburn in 2007.

Georgia’s most successful football coach, Vince Dooley is an Auburn grad. Pat Dye, a very successful coach for Auburn is a Georgia alum. Both men are members of the College Football Hall of Fame.

4. The World Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party is a moniker that will never go away despite the best efforts of both school’s administrators. Except for two years while Jacksonville was constructing its new football stadium, the game has been held in Jacksonville with tickets being split evenly between the two schools since 1933. The first game was played in 1904 in the city of Macon, although Florida says their football program did not officially start until 1906. In previous seasons the game visited Savannah,Tampa and Macon.

In reality, this is an annual party that happens to have a football game break out. The color and pagentry is unmatched in today’s SEC. Seating for the two schools was once divide
d into eighths, that was reduced to quarters and is now halved, creating only two lines of demarcation.

Both schools celebrate many moments in this rivalry, none bigger than Georgia’s come from behind victory in 1980 marked by Buck Belue’s pass to Lyndsay Scott for a  92 yard touchdown. Larry Munson’s call of this game is probably the most recognizable play-by-play call of any SEC football play.

Georgia leads the series 47 (46)-39-2 despite Florida’s recent run of 17-3 since 1990.

5. Sometimes dubbed “The Third Saturday in September”, the Florida – Tennessee game does not have the history of most rivalries, but few games have been as important since the SEC began divisional play. The teams have only met 39 times with Florida leading the overall series 20-19. This is a rivalry born of the SEC’s expansion and move to divisional play.

Since 1992 Florida (10), Tennessee (5) and Georgia (3) are the only teams to represent the East in the SEC Championship game. Florida’s dominance of both Tennessee and Georgia since expansion is evident. As painful as it has been for Georgia, Tennessee normally had more at stake in their contest with Florida. In the 90′s the Tennessee Florida game was often seen as a divisional championship game.

Of all my picks, this is probably the biggest reach. The series is relatively even, but the meaningful games have broken decidedly towards the Gators. Still, there is no denying how high the stakes have been when these teams have faced each other early in the seasons. Furthermore, in recent memory, no two teams have placed as much future NFL talent on the field at the same time as these two SEC powerhouses.

Upon review, I may not have done a good job of keeping my bias at bay. The lack of an LSU in any top 5 list concerning the SEC surely must be an oversight. LSU plays in three great traditional rivalries, Bama, Auburn and Ole Miss, plus the LSU-Florida game is an annual must see event. Still I do not know which of the 5 I would drop when looking at the entire history of the series.

You tell me, what did I get wrong, and what did I get right? Should LSU havemade the list? Am I not giving the Egg Bowl proper respect? I am sure of one thing, the SEC is full of outstanding rivalries.