Foots Prints

The 114th football game between Southeastern Conference rivals Louisiana State University (LSU) and the University of Mississippi (Ole Miss) is taking place in Baton Rouge as I type this. Unfortunately, the Rebels appear well on their way to their first win at Tiger Stadium since 2008, as they lead 17-7 with 102 seconds remaining in the first half.

LSU is not only celebrating homecoming tonight, it is also marking the 100th anniversary of Tiger Stadium, known popularly throughout Louisiana and the college football universe as Death Valley. Clemson likes to call its Memorial Stadium as Death Valley, but South Carolina venue cannot be as loud as the one near the banks of the Mississippi River because it is dug into the ground, and LSU’s stadium is not, meaning the sound is kept in the concrete facility.

I think LSU made a huge mistake celebrating the centennial tonight for two reasons.

First, the actual date of the first game in Tiger Stadium was November 27, 1924. The Tigers have not one, but TWO games not too far from that date, Nov. 23 vs. Vanderbilt and Nov. 30 vs. SEC newcomer Oklahoma. Either of those games would have been far more appropriate to celebrate the centennial than this one in October. The weather will likely be much better, and there would not be the added distraction of homecoming.
LSU should have waited until the much-anticipated game vs. the Sooners, which will be only the third all-time between the teams, and the first not played at the Sugar Bowl (Oklahoma won 35-0 after the 1949 season; LSU won 21-14 after the 2003 season, clinching a share of the national championship along the way). If LSU was afraid of not having students on campus due to the Thanksgiving holiday, it could have celebrated vs. the Commodores, who are a big deal this season thanks to last week’s shocker vs. Alabama.

First, LSU is far too obsessed with Ole Miss and Alabama. In years the Tigers host the Rebels and Crimson Tide–which has been every even-numbered year since 2002–it seems like LSU puts all its promotional eggs into those baskets and ignores other teams coming to Death Valley, even if those teams are highly ranked (Georgia and Tennessee depending upon the year) or major conference teams which rarely show up in Baton Rouge (UCLA this year, plus Virginia Tech and West Virginia since 2000).

The Alabama obsession went way too far in the 17 seasons (2007-23) when Nick Saban coached the Crimson Tide. I understand LSU fans were angry he went to Alabama, but they need to realize (a) Saban did not leave Baton Rouge directly for Tuscaloosa; he spent two seasons in the NFL with the Dolphins before rolling with the Tide; and (b) LSU was a steaming pile of dog poop in the 11 seasons before Saban’s arrival for the 2000 season, suffering through eight losing seasons, including a 16-28 ledger during Curley Hallman’s four year reign of error (1991-94). Any LSU fan who hates Saban simply because he donned crimson needs to stop watching LSU football.

Alabama doesn’t consider LSU to be a true rival. Tide fans consider Auburn and Tennessee the real rivals. I was seriously hoping the schools would stop playing every year, but now Brian Kelly WANTS to play Alabama every year under a nine-game SEC schedule.

This all could have stopped in 2012 when Missouri and Texas A&M joined the SEC. SEC commissioner Mike Slive didn’t have the balls to simply move Alabama and Auburn to the East division and allow Mizzou and A&M to slide into the West.

Auburn was eager to move east, where it could play Florida and Tennessee yearly as they did before the 1992 additions of Arkansas and South Carolina. Alabama, however, bitched and moaned about possibly not playing Tennessee every year. Guess who did most of the bitching? Nick Saban.

Slive caved and put Mizzou in the East, despite it being WEST of every SEC school except Arkansas and A&M. If Saban would have said he was afraid of playing Florida and Georgia every year, it would have been more plausible than his public comments. Did he not realize he would be playing Auburn and Tennessee as division foes? And he could have kept one rivalry from the West, whether it be LSU or Mississippi State.

Enough about Alabama.

Growing up, I never thought of LSU-Ole Miss being that great of a rivalry. I thought the rivalry had been overblown by some games in the late 1950s through the early 1970s which were memorable, yes, but not enough to call Tigers vs. Rebels one of college football’s greatest rivalries.

In 1958 and ’59, the teams played a trilogy of classics.

In 1958, the Tigers’ 14-0 win at home was the springboard to the national championship. LSU clinched the title by scoring 56 second half points in a 62-0 romp vs. Tulane in New Orleans (the final polls were released the first week of December and did not count bowl games).

One year later, Billy Cannon’s famous 89-yard punt return five minutes into the fourth quarter, followed by a goal line stand where Cannon and Warren Rabb stopped Ole Miss’ third-string quarterback, Doug Elmore, at the Tiger 1-yard line, gave LSU a 7-3 win. However, the Tigers’ hopes for another championship ended one week later in Knoxville when Paul Dietzel foolishly chose to attempt a two-point conversion following a touchdown near the end of the game. It was stopped, and the Volunteers won 14-13. Syracuse went on to win the national championship.
Ole Miss accepted an invitation to the Sugar Bowl following its 9-1 regular season. LSU at first rejected invitations by several bowls, but changed its mind under mysterious circumstances and agreed to a rematch in the Big Easy.
LSU should have stuck to its guns and stayed home. Ole Miss outgained the Tigers 373-74 and won 21-0 in a game which wasn’t as close as the final score.

Elisha Archibald Manning, known to nearly all as Archie, became the Rebels’ starting quarterback in his sophomore season of 1968 (freshmen were not eligible for varsity from 1954-71). He led Ole Miss to two nail-biting victories vs. LSU in his first two seasons, 27-24 at Baton Rouge in 1968 and 26-23 at Jackson in 1969. The latter game would be the Tigers’ only loss in 1969, but LSU did not go bowling.
LSU believed it would be invited to the Cotton Bowl to play the winner of the Texas-Arkansas game scheduled for December 6. However, Notre Dame, deep in debt due to declining enrollment, elected to end its 44-year bowl moratorium. The folks in Dallas quickly snapped up the Fighting Irish. The Sugar Bowl, angered by LSU’s disinterest, instead invited Ole Miss, which lost to Kentucky, Alabama and Houston. LSU refused the Bluebonnet and Gator, and thus got
In 1970, LSU got its revenge on Archie and the Rebels, rolling to a 61-17 blowout in a game shown to three-quarters of the country by ABC. The win clinched the SEC championship and an Orange Bowl bid for the Tigers.

Two years later, Ole Miss limped into Baton Rouge 4-3, while LSU was 7-0 and ranked seventh. However, New Orleans native (actually Chalmette, the epicenter of flooding during Hurricane Katrina) Norris Weese led the Rebels to a 16-10 advantage with time running out.
The Tigers pulled it out when Bert Jones hit Brad Davis with a 10-yard touchdown pass on the game’s final play. The play started with one second on the clock, and most Ole Miss fans and players believed the clock operator was very slow in stopping the clock on the previous play, which began with four seconds to go. There was no instant replay in 1972, so the touchdown stood. Rusty Jackson successfully kicked the extra point; a miss would have resulted in a tie, since there was no overtime until 1996.

Since 1972, Ole Miss has been an afterthought in the SEC in most seasons, save for Eli Manning’s senior year when the Rebels’ only conference loss–17-14 to LSU in Oxford–cost them their first SEC championship game berth, a couple of seasons in the mid-2010s under Hugh Freeze, and since 2020, when Lane Kiffin arrived.

Despite this, LSU still has a sore spot for the Rebels and amps up the intensity for the invaders from Oxford. I don’t get it.