|
|
By B.J. Bennett
SouthernPigskin.com Senior Editor
SouthernPigskin.com Senior Editor B.J. Bennett continues his original series of college football in the South. Follow us on Twitter at Twitter.com/SouthernPigskin
Down Here VIII is the eighth installment of Bennett's continuing series on southern college football. Click to read Down Here I, Down Here II, Down Here III, Down Here IV, Down Here V, Down Here VI or Down Here VII. Email Bennett your southern college football thoughts at .
Rivalry week is a southern rite of passage. Don't get me wrong, we're serious year-round, but the last weekend of November hits us like a powerful church sermon, a glare from grandma and a spicy spoonful of hoppin' johns all at once. Sure this week is about being around loved ones, just as long as nobody says anything stupid and there is a flat screen TV around. For six days we're absolutely intolerable to be around, loud, obnoxious and proud with a tunnel vision that makes us counter-productive at work, a horrid example of sanity for the children and walking citation waiting to happen. Then we get to gameday.
Saturday comes like a Molly Hatchet guitar rift as we all wake up with a just-having-worked-out adrenaline rush, even if we haven't done so in years.
"If you can't get up for the USC game, you shouldn't be at Clemson," Clemson receiver Jacoby Ford told The State’s Paul Strelow.
We appreciate our friends, family and good food this week, as long as we can celebrate together before Saturday. Thanksgiving Day in my family is always interesting as, everyone included, the Bennett's and Lee's consist of unhinged football fanatics from the Sunshine State to the Carolina triangle to Hot'lanta. Growing up, my brother and I used to get the stern talk from dad on the way to the reunion. "Don't start no crap when we get here..." he would say in his military voice. Then mom, ironically enough, would look at us and smile knowing that his efforts were futile; we would simply be waiting for the right time.
Lunchtime angst would rise like the creeks in Coastal Georgia. After the obligatory family questions nobody really cared to answer, my dad called this the "How's your Mommaanddem?" segment (because my brother and I would see cousins we didn't recognize and dad told us to smile and utter that cure-all phrase), you could feel, for lack of a better phrase, the tide starting to come in. All of the men in the family would stand around, looking at the ground before one eager soul would ultimately offer up a condescending jab. The women in the family would sigh and walk off, rolling their eyes with that "here we go again" look, and it would be on.
Like kids running to an ice cream truck on a hot summer day, the frantic melee would begin. That first snide remark was our jingle cue. Uncles and cousins standing a hundred feet away would jog towards our treat truck, smiles on faces. Family favoring the current champion would talk trash about this year with an arrogant, bad-guy-in-a-movie smirk. Those in rebuilding mode would call upon their glory years, citing past accomplishments and heroes of old. The followers of the cellar-dwellers would simply make fun of your sunglasses and your shoes.
With rivalry week, the smack doesn't end with the fans either.
"The first person I would like to thank is the good Lord, for giving me the ability to play the game of football. Because without the ability to play the game I would have been at Auburn," former Crimson Tide star Marty Lyons once joked.
Rivalry week is all about reminiscing. True nostalgia. Grandparents and great uncles proudly tell stories from Alabama/Auburn, Clemson/South Carolina or the Egg Bowl like they are recalling memories about their own kids. They will tell of the "Run in the Mud" between the Crimson Tide and Tigers in 1967 or Van Tiffin's kick in 1985, the "Immaculate Deflection" in 1983 between Ole Miss and Mississippi State or the 1997 Clemson/Carolina game known as "The Catch".
"A game like this, Alabama players will remember it for the rest of their lives. Auburn players...it'll eat their guts out the rest of their lives," then Tiger coach Pat Dye said after that famed 1985 Iron Bowl.
Rivalry week divides families and splits states in two like a knife through hot bread. Florida and Florida State can't seem to get together without a near pre-game rumble at midfield every year. Because of various arguments, Auburn, after a game in 1901, didn't play in Tuscaloosa again until the year 2000. The Georgia/Georgia Tech rivalry is actually nicknamed "Clean, Old Fashioned Hate"; pretty descriptive. The Golden Egg Trophy itself was created because of an early 20th century brawl that stemmed from Ole Miss fans tearing down MSU's (then Mississippi A&M) goalposts. Bulldog fans defended their field with wooden chairs. To avoid future souvenir grabbing, the trophy was created in 1927.
"The rivalry is very, very tough. Always very competitive," said Ole Miss head coach Houston Nutt of the Egg Bowl in an exclusive interview with staff writer Kevin Thomas. "Every convenience store, every Wal-Mart, every Burger King you go into there's somebody from Ole Miss, somebody from Mississippi State, so the state is truly divided. Just makes this rivalry very, very big. LSU is big, but this is always bigger. You want to win the game at home, you want to win the game in state between the state rivals. It's so big, bragging rights for a year, so it's so important."
The scene will be a similar one all over the southeast this week. In states like Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia, rivalry tensions are at an all-time high. Part of what makes rivalry week so special is the fact that the biggest games of the year are intertwined with family holiday gatherings. In the south, that's like giving little Jimmy matches, two hours of free time and a six-pack of Mountain Dew.
While every fall Saturday and every game down here is special, no week of games is more sacred than the ones coming this Saturday. Ask some fans and 1-11 with that key victory would beat 11-1 with an in-state loss.
"Sure I'd like to beat Notre Dame, don't get me wrong," the great Bear Bryant once explained, "but nothing matters more than beating that cow college on the other side of the state."
Former Georgia All-American offensive lineman Matt Stinchcomb went a step further.
“There is a Tech contingent in my family,” he told me, “this game determines what time and even if I show for the reunion.”
Thanksgiving is about being thankful and eating ourselves into a stupor, but this weekend is about winning. Pride comes in many forms; a ring, a bowl game berth or a Golden Boot, Golden Egg, Victory Bell or Commonwealth Cup. Thursday we eat, Friday we drink, Saturday we'll be merry.
"They said they had the number one defense in the nation, but they didn't show it. They didn't step up to the challenge. They said a lot of things, but you know what? They can put this loss in a turkey and smoke it," former Auburn linebacker Karlos Dansby said of Alabama in 2002.
The Thanksgiving/rivalry week pairing is so unique because it puts our priorities on full display. And make no mistake about where our allegiances lie; we don’t walk around with our family name on our shirts. We all love our family, but this week DNA eats at the kid table. Blood is thicker than water, but it isn't thicker than face paint.
.....
Share your thoughts on the SouthernPigskin.com Message Boards or email us at . Follow SouthernPigskin.com on Twitter at Twitter.com/SouthernPigskin
|
Comments
Make Yourself Heard
|
|
