Gentlemen,
We are five days away from one of the biggest games of the college football year. Let's take the opportunity to discuss how big this game is and what your educated thoughts are. I say that b/c I have been known to get into some uneducated conversations with Bama fans in the past. This game opened at Alabama -4 which is a bit suprising but we will see how the week shakes out with respect to where the action comes in.
This isn't a winner-take-all game for the SEC West title, something that surprisingly has still never happened in Iron Bowl history but the game has an undefeated team eyeing a national championship. For the second consecutive year, the game has a Heisman Trophy frontrunner.
The Iron Bowl, which this state attempts to strangle to death annually with incessant hype, can justify the attention this year.
It's only the sixth Iron Bowl with top-10 teams ever, joining 1994, 1974, 1972, 1971 and 1963.
Alabama is only a year removed from winning the national title. Auburn could claim the next one before Nick Saban's statue is even in the ground.
Mark Ingram is only a year removed from winning Alabama's first Heisman Trophy. If Ingram chooses, he could vote this year for another Iron Bowl participant, Cam Newton, whose only obstacle now is pay-for-play accusations.
No state has ever had two different schools produce national champions and Heisman Trophy winners in consecutive years. None. Not Florida. Not California. Not Texas. Alabama would be the first.
Since the AP poll started in 1936, Texas is the only state with two different national champions in consecutive years. TCU won in 1938 and Texas A&M in 1939. Two states have produced back-to-back Heisman winners from different teams. Miami's Gino Torretta (1992) and Florida State's Charlie Ward (1993) won from Florida, and UCLA's Gary Beban (UCLA) and USC's O.J. Simpson (1968) did it from California.
Auburn and Alabama enter Friday with two losses between them, tied for the sixth-fewest in the Iron Bowl since it was renewed in 1948. Both teams were undefeated in 1994 and 1971, and one team had one loss in 1993, 1974 and 1972.
Only two other times has there been an undefeated team in the Iron Bowl for at least three straight years, as is the case now. The other time periods: 1992 to 1994 and 1971 to 1974.
History suggests that, contrary to the cliche, don't necessarily throw out the records when picking a winner.
Since 1981, the team with the better record has won the Iron Bowl 70 percent of the time. That's higher than the rate for many other late-season Rivalry games, including Florida-Florida State, Oregon-Oregon State, Harvard-Yale, Georgia-Auburn, Michigan-Ohio State and USC-UCLA.
Auburn has two more wins than Alabama. When they are separated by two wins or more, the team with the better record has won 35 of 42 times (83 percent) since 1948.
The day-after-Thanksgiving date again speeds up the around-the-clock hype for the Iron Bowl. It's justified this time.
We are five days away from one of the biggest games of the college football year. Let's take the opportunity to discuss how big this game is and what your educated thoughts are. I say that b/c I have been known to get into some uneducated conversations with Bama fans in the past. This game opened at Alabama -4 which is a bit suprising but we will see how the week shakes out with respect to where the action comes in.
This isn't a winner-take-all game for the SEC West title, something that surprisingly has still never happened in Iron Bowl history but the game has an undefeated team eyeing a national championship. For the second consecutive year, the game has a Heisman Trophy frontrunner.
The Iron Bowl, which this state attempts to strangle to death annually with incessant hype, can justify the attention this year.
It's only the sixth Iron Bowl with top-10 teams ever, joining 1994, 1974, 1972, 1971 and 1963.
Alabama is only a year removed from winning the national title. Auburn could claim the next one before Nick Saban's statue is even in the ground.
Mark Ingram is only a year removed from winning Alabama's first Heisman Trophy. If Ingram chooses, he could vote this year for another Iron Bowl participant, Cam Newton, whose only obstacle now is pay-for-play accusations.
No state has ever had two different schools produce national champions and Heisman Trophy winners in consecutive years. None. Not Florida. Not California. Not Texas. Alabama would be the first.
Since the AP poll started in 1936, Texas is the only state with two different national champions in consecutive years. TCU won in 1938 and Texas A&M in 1939. Two states have produced back-to-back Heisman winners from different teams. Miami's Gino Torretta (1992) and Florida State's Charlie Ward (1993) won from Florida, and UCLA's Gary Beban (UCLA) and USC's O.J. Simpson (1968) did it from California.
Auburn and Alabama enter Friday with two losses between them, tied for the sixth-fewest in the Iron Bowl since it was renewed in 1948. Both teams were undefeated in 1994 and 1971, and one team had one loss in 1993, 1974 and 1972.
Only two other times has there been an undefeated team in the Iron Bowl for at least three straight years, as is the case now. The other time periods: 1992 to 1994 and 1971 to 1974.
History suggests that, contrary to the cliche, don't necessarily throw out the records when picking a winner.
Since 1981, the team with the better record has won the Iron Bowl 70 percent of the time. That's higher than the rate for many other late-season Rivalry games, including Florida-Florida State, Oregon-Oregon State, Harvard-Yale, Georgia-Auburn, Michigan-Ohio State and USC-UCLA.
Auburn has two more wins than Alabama. When they are separated by two wins or more, the team with the better record has won 35 of 42 times (83 percent) since 1948.
The day-after-Thanksgiving date again speeds up the around-the-clock hype for the Iron Bowl. It's justified this time.