Game of the Century (college football)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The phrase "Game of the Century" refers to several contests in the history of college football in the United States. In each listing, the visiting team is listed first unless the game was played at a neutral site, in which case the teams are listed in alphabetical order.
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[edit] 1916 Georgia Tech vs. Cumberland
The October 7, 1916, American football game between the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets and the Cumberland College Bulldogs (now Cumberland University) was the most-lopsided game in the history of college football. Georgia Tech won, 222-0.
Cumberland, a school in Lebanon, Tennessee, had actually discontinued its football program before the season but had forgotten to cancel its game against the Yellow Jackets. Tech coach John Heisman was in no mood to accommodate the Bulldogs, perhaps because Tech's baseball team had lost 22-0 to Cumberland the previous year. He insisted on the schools' scheduling agreement, which required Cumberland to pay $3,000 (a lot of money in 1916) to Tech if its football team failed to show. So, George Allen (who was elected to serve as Cumberland's football team student manager after first serving as the baseball team student manager) put together a scrub team of 14 men (some being his Kappa Sigma brothers) to travel to Atlanta as Cumberland's football team.
Cumberland received the opening kickoff and failed to make a first down. After a punt, the Yellow Jackets scored on their first play. Cumberland then fumbled on their next play from scrimmage, and a Tech player returned the fumble for a touchdown. The Bulldogs fumbled again on their next play, and it took Tech two runs to score its third touchdown. Cumberland lost nine yards on its next possession, then gave up a fourth touchdown on another two-play Tech drive.
The Yellow Jackets led 63-0 after the first quarter and 126-0 at halftime. Tech added 54 more points in the third quarter and 42 in the final period.
Several myths have developed around the game. Some people have written that Cumberland did not have a single play that gained yards; in fact, its longest play was a 10-yard pass (on 4th-and-22). One page on Cumberland's website says the Yellow Jackets scored on every offensive play, but the play-by-play account of the game posted online says otherwise.
[edit] 1946 Army vs. Notre Dame
November 9, 1946: Army (the football program of the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York), then ranked Number 1 in the Associated Press college football poll, played the University of Notre Dame, of South Bend, Indiana, ranked Number 2, at Yankee Stadium in New York City.
With Army the representation of American strength, and Notre Dame being America's unofficial Catholic university, this was as close to a truly national contest as college football has ever had. This matchup, with the national attention it got in the era before the service academies ceased to be major football powers, was usually played at a neutral site, often in New York City. The 1924 game between the schools, a Notre Dame victory at the Polo Grounds, was the game at which sportswriter Grantland Rice christened the Fighting Irish backfield -- quarterback Harry Stuhldreher, halfbacks Jim Crowley and Don Miller, and fullback Elmer Layden -- the "Four Horsemen." The 1928 edition, with Notre Dame trailing Army at halftime at Yankee Stadium, was the game where Notre Dame coach Knute Rockne delivered his "Win one for the Gipper" speech, resulting in a comeback win for the Fighting Irish.
Both teams were undefeated going into the 1946 game at Yankee Stadium. Both teams averaged over 30 points per game. Army had a 25-game winning streak, last losing to Notre Dame in 1943 (26-0), but had won the last two contests between the schools by scores of 59-0 and 48-0. Army had the defending Heisman Trophy winner, Doc Blanchard, also known as "Mr. Inside," the man who would win it that year, Glenn Davis, also known as "Mr. Outside," and one of the nation's top quarterbacks in Arnold Tucker. Notre Dame had the quarterback who would win the Heisman the next year, Johnny Lujack. Both Tucker and Lujack were also outstanding defensive backs at a time when football players, college as well as professional, usually played both offense and defense.
Despite the high-scoring and much-hyped offenses, the game ended in a scoreless tie, with each school's best scoring drive coming back-to-back: Tucker intercepting Lujack, and Lujack then making a touchdown-saving tackle on Blanchard a few plays later. Notre Dame's defense did something no other team had ever done — it held the famous "Touchdown Twins," Blanchard and Davis, to a total of 79 yards. As an indication of how the defense of both teams dominated, seven linemen in that game were nominated for Lineman of the Week honors in the weekly Associated Press poll. Joe Steffy, an Army guard who helped shut down the Notre Dame running game, won the honor, followed closely by Notre Dame right tackle George Sullivan and freshman lineman Jim Martin who helped stifle Army's running attack and dropped Davis on consecutive plays for losses totalling 17 yards. Both Notre Dame coach Leahy and Army coach Blaik called the game "a terrific battle of defenses."
Both teams would finish the season undefeated with this one tie, but it was Notre Dame that was awarded the National Championship by the Associated Press, with Army coming in second. Neither school accepted bowl bids in that era, and so neither put itself at risk of a loss that would have tarnished their National Championship bid.
With Blanchard, Davis and Tucker having graduated, Army's winning streak would be broken the next year, by Columbia University. Notre Dame would not lose again until early in the 1950 season.
[edit] 1966 Notre Dame vs. Michigan State
November 19, 1966: Notre Dame vs. Michigan State University, at Spartan Stadium in East Lansing, Michigan. Notre Dame, which hadn't won a National Championship since 1953 (a long drought by their standards), was ranked Number 1. Host Michigan State, who had been upset by UCLA in the Rose Bowl the previous year, costing them a national title, entered the game ranked Number 2. The Fighting Irish, whose bid for a National Championship two years earlier was snuffed out by USC, were hungry, while the Spartans had history and home-field advantage on their side. This was the first time in 20 years that a college football was given the "Game of the Century" tag by the national media, and ABC had the nation's viewers in its grip, with equal parts Notre Dame fans and Notre Dame haters.
Interestingly enough, the game was not shown live on national TV. Each team was allotted one national television appearance and two regional television appearances each season. Notre Dame had used their national TV slot in the season opening game against Purdue. ABC executives did not even want to show the game anywhere but the regional area, but pressure from the West Coast and the South (to the tune of 50 000 letters) made ABC air the game on tape delay.
Irish quarterback Terry Hanratty was knocked out after getting sacked in the first quarter by Spartan defensive lineman Bubba Smith. Starting Notre Dame running back Nick Eddy was out entirely after hurting his shoulder getting off the train in East Lansing. And Michigan State held a 10-0 lead by early in the second quarter. But the Irish came back, and tied the game in the third quarter. Notre Dame had the ball on its own 30-yard line with 1:10 to go, needing about 40 yards for a game-winning field goal. But coach Ara Parseghian chose to run the clock out, preserving the tie and Notre Dame's Number 1 ranking. The game ended in a 10-10 tie.
For nearly 40 years, Parseghian has defended his end-of-the-game strategy, which left many fans feeling disappointed at the game not having some sort of resolution, Michigan State fans and other Notre Dame haters calling him a coward, and college football expert Dan Jenkins leading off his article for Sports Illustrated by saying Parseghian chose to "Tie one for the Gipper." In addition to holding the Number 2 team in the country, the defending National Champions, to a standstill on their own field, without his own starting quarterback and one of his starting running backs, Parseghian's backup quarterback, Coley O'Brien, was a diabetic, and exhausted to the point where he couldn't throw. At that point, a tie fit Notre Dame's hopes just as well as a win would have.
Notre Dame beat USC 51-0 the next week, completing an undefeated regular season and solidifying their Number 1 claim. The Irish did not accept bowl bids until 1969 (see below), and Michigan State was the victim of a pair of Big Ten rules that would be rescinded a few years later: The same school could not represent the league in the Rose Bowl in back-to-back seasons, and only the league Champions could accept a bowl bid, unless they refused the Rose Bowl bid or, because it was on probation, were prohibited from accepting the bid, which, in either case, would then go to the second-place team. So despite being Big Ten Champions and undefeated in the regular season, in each case for two seasons in a row, the Spartans could not play in the Rose Bowl.
For more information, read: The Biggest Game of Them All: Notre Dame, Michigan State and the Fall of 1966 by Mike Celzic (ISBN 0671758179).
[edit] 1967 USC vs. UCLA
November 18, 1967: The University of California at Los Angeles, 7-0-1 and ranked Number 1, with senior quarterback Gary Beban as a Heisman Trophy candidate, played the University of Southern California, 8-1 and ranked Number 3, with junior running back O. J. Simpson as a Heisman candidate. UCLA's tie and USC's loss were both inflicted by Oregon State University and their famed Giant Killers team.
Both teams played their home games at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum until 1982, when UCLA first went outside the city of Los Angeles to play at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, in whose New Year's Day bowl game USC has played so many times that it came to feel like a second home field. So this game was for the championship of Los Angeles, the Championship of the Pacific Eight Conference (now the Pacific Ten), for a berth in the Rose Bowl game, and for the right to play for the National Championship.
With the game tied 14-14 early in the fourth quarter, an injured Beban gamely threw a touchdown pass, but the extra point attempt was blocked, resulting in a 20-14 UCLA lead. Trojan quarterback Toby Page called a pass play, then saw the Bruin linebackers drop back into pass coverage. He changed the signals before the snap, and handed off to Simpson, who ran 64 yards for a touchdown. USC kicked the extra point, and held on to win, 21-20.
Despite the loss, Beban would win the Heisman; Simpson would win it the next season. Simpson would go on to have one of the greatest professional careers any running back has ever had, rushing for over 11,000 yards, mostly for the Buffalo Bills, at a time when an NFL season was still 14 games. But Beban was a bust as a pro; he was drafted by the Washington Redskins, who already had a future Hall of Fame quarterback in Sonny Jurgensen. The 'Skins moved Beban to wide receiver, and he lasted only two seasons.
Keith Jackson, who covered the game for ABC, declared it many years later to be the greatest game he has ever seen. So did Giles Pellerin, a USC graduate who attended every game USC played from 1926 until his death at the 1998 USC-UCLA game at the Rose Bowl, 797 straight games over 72 years, almost certainly a record for any college football fan. This is regarded as the signature game in the UCLA-USC rivalry
[edit] 1969 Texas vs. Arkansas
December 6, 1969: University of Texas at Austin vs. University of Arkansas. In a game between unbeatens played at Arkansas' Razorback Stadium in Fayetteville, the Texas Longhorns were ranked Number 1 in the country, having won 18 straight games. The Arkansas Razorbacks were ranked Number 2, having won 15 straight.
This game would decide the Southwest Conference Championship, as well as its berth in the Cotton Bowl, setting it up to win the National Championship. Sensing that the matchup might be a possible 1-vs.-2 showdown, ABC offered to move the game from October 18 to December 6 to give it more of a national audience, and the schools, enjoying the publicity, accepted. It worked as the move made it the focus of the entire sporting world doing a television rating of a 50 share, meaning half the TV sets in the country were tuned to this game.
President Richard Nixon attended the game along with several members of his staff and U.S. Representatives George H.W. Bush of Texas and John Paul Hammerschmidt of Arkansas, having announced that he would give a plaque to the winner, proclaiming it to be the National Champion -- to the chagrin of observers who thought it premature to do so before the New Year's Day bowl games, and of fans of Pennsylvania State University, which would also end the season undefeated. Arkansas took a 14-0 lead, and held it into the fourth quarter, but Texas came from behind to win, 15-14, and accepted Nixon's plaque.
Texas beat Notre Dame in the Cotton Bowl, and removed any doubt as to whether it deserved consideration as National Champion, although Penn State fans still insist that their team, also undefeated and winner of the Orange Bowl, was better. However, it is worth noting that the Cotton Bowl first invited Penn State to play the Southwest Conference champions. The Nittany Lions declined the invitation, preferring to spend New Year's Day in warm Miami, where they defeated Big 8 champion Missouri. The 1969 Texas-Penn State conflict, never settled on the field, has been one of the major arguments in favor of a Division I-A playoff. Arkansas lost the Sugar Bowl to Ole Miss. The entire Texas-Penn State debate and Nixon's involvement led to a quote from Penn State coach Joe Paterno, a conservative Republican, during a commencement speech at Penn State in 1974 about Nixon, "How could Nixon know so much about college football in 1969 and so little about Watergate in 1974?"
This game has been nicknamed "Dixie's Last Stand," since it was the last major American sporting event played between two all-white teams, although two schools in the Southeastern Conference, LSU and Ole Miss, did not integrate their varsity football squads until 1972.
With the Vietnam War still raging and Nixon in attendance, protestors came to the game, and one of them got into a tree overlooking the stadium and held up an antiwar sign. An urban legend grew up around this game, claiming that this protestor was Arkansas native and future President Bill Clinton. Clinton, however, was not at the game, as he was then a Rhodes scholar at Oxford University in England, and was listening to the game on a shortwave radio with some American friends.
The two coaches in this game, Darrell Royal of Texas and Frank Broyles of Arkansas, both retired after the 1976 season and became the athletic directors at their respective schools. Broyles is still the Razorbacks' athletic director (as of 2006) and spearheaded Arkansas' move from the Southwest Conference to the SEC in 1990. Broyles was instrumental in the Razorbacks and Longhorns playing a two-year series in 2003 (at Austin) and 2004 (at Fayetteville).
The details of the political climate in the leadup to this game in terms of racial tensions and anti-Vietnam war sentiments are documented in the book Horns, Hogs and Nixon Coming by Terry Frei (ISBN 0743224477).
[edit] 1971 Nebraska vs. Oklahoma
November 25, 1971: The University of Nebraska, defending National Champions, ranked Number 1 with a 29-game winning streak, and led by flanker, Johnny Rodgers, who would go on to win the Heisman Trophy the next season, played the University of Oklahoma, ranked Number 2 and led by running back Greg Pruitt, a favorite for the Heisman this time.
The game was played at Owen Field in Norman, Oklahoma on Thanksgiving Day, on ABC in front of a national television audience. The game would decide the championship of the Big Eight Conference and a bid to the Orange Bowl. Despite Oklahoma's national prominence, gained in the 1950s, having slipped in the 1960s, and Nebraska not having a national following prior to the previous year's National Championship, over 55 million people watched, the largest TV audience yet for a college football game.
The game went back and forth. Nebraska held a 14-3 lead, but Oklahoma came back, and the Sooners led at halftime, 17-14, the first time the Cornhuskers had trailed all season. The Huskers retook the lead and led 28-17 going into the fourth quarter. Quarterback Jack Mildren led the Sooners back, and Oklahoma led 31-28 with 7:05 to play. The Huskers got the ball back on their own 26-yard line. Getting to the Oklahoma 48, Husker quarterback Jerry Tagge threw to Rodgers, who broke tackles and ran all the way to the 15. Jeff Kinney then carried four times, the last resulting in his fourth touchdown of the game, and Nebraska led 35-31 with two minutes to go. Sacks of Mildren on third and fourth down in Sooner territory finished the game off as a Nebraska win.
This game, much more than the previous year's National Championship, made Nebraska a program with a national following. Already having sold every seat available at their Memorial Stadium since coach Bob Devaney arrived in 1962, they would be a perennial National Championship contender and a frequent presence on national TV, with fans across the country seeing banners at Memorial Stadium reading "Californians for Nebraska," "Floridians for Nebraska," and so on. Nebraska native Johnny Carson (an alumnus of NU) would often take pride in the Cornhuskers' accomplishments during his monologue as host of The Tonight Show, and fellow Nebraskan Dick Cavett would also mention them on his talk show.
The Cornhuskers went on to defeat the University of Alabama, by then ranked Number 2, 38-6 in the Orange Bowl, completing their back-to-back National Championships. Devaney coached for one more year, going 9-2-1, before becoming Nebraska's athletic director and he handed the reins over to assistant Tom Osborne.
Pruitt ended up not winning the Heisman, which went to Auburn University quarterback Pat Sullivan. By a coincidence, Auburn was the team Oklahoma would end up playing, in the Sugar Bowl, and the Sooners won, 40-22. (By another coincidence, these two arch-rivals, Nebraska and Oklahoma, would end up playing each half of another nasty rivalry, Alabama and Auburn, and beat them both.)
Despite the defeat, Oklahoma's program was also relaunched by this game, and they would be a perennial National Championship contender throughout the 1970s and much of the 1980s. Oklahoma coach Chuck Fairbanks left the Sooners following the 1972 season to become the head coach of the New England Patriots of the NFL. Offensive coordinator Barry Switzer succeeded Fairbanks and compiled a 157-29-4 record from 1973 through 1988 and guided the Sooners to national championships in 1974, 1975, and 1985.
Nebraska vs. Oklahoma, considered a minor rivalry before this Game of the Century, became one of the biggest in the country, usually played on the day after Thanksgiving, until scandal caught up with Oklahoma in the late 1980s, sending it into a decline, which coincided with the rise of the football program at the University of Colorado, which began to replace Oklahoma as Nebraska's biggest rival.
Oklahoma would rise again in the late 1990s, as the Big Eight took on four Southwest Conference schools to become the Big 12, but since one of those four schools was Texas, and they already had a big rivalry with Oklahoma, that rivlary grew in importance. Since Oklahoma and Oklahoma State University were put in the Big 12 Southern Division, while Nebraska and the other Big Eight teams went into the Big 12 North, Nebraska and Oklahoma no longer even play each other every season, resulting in a further diminishing of that rivalry.
After this game, considered by many, then and now, to be the greatest game in college football history, usage of the phrase "Game of the Century" to describe big matchups, even Number 1 vs. Number 2 games, was taken far less seriously. Most college football observers, hearing the words "Game of the Century," think 1971 Nebraska vs. Oklahoma first.
A detailed narrative of the game can be found in The Game of the Century by Michael Corcoran (ISBN 0743236211).
[edit] 1987 Miami vs. Penn State
January 2, 1987: In the next "Game of the Century," the largest television audience in college football history watches as the undefeated and #1 Miami Hurricanes battle the undefeated and #2 Penn State Nittany Lions in the Fiesta Bowl for the national championship.[1] The game garnered a 25.1 television rating, with an average of 21,940,000 viewers watching the NBC telecast per minute.[2]
Of the two teams, Miami had the starpower, as it was led by Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback Vinny Testaverde, running back Alonzo Highsmith, and defensive tackle Jerome Brown, all of whom would be selected within the first nine picks of that April's NFL Draft. Miami was seldom challenged during the regular season and was considered a prohibitive favorite over the gritty Nittany Lions. Tensions between the teams were heightened when Miami players attended a Fiesta Bowl barbeque held days before the game dressed in fatigues.
The game played out in surprising fashion. Miami's offense had little trouble moving the ball, yet the vaunted Penn State defense was able to pressure Testaverde enough (four sacks) that the Hurricanes committed a whopping seven turnovers (five interceptions, two fumbles). Miami scored first to take a 7-0 lead, but Penn State would answer with a touchdown of its own to tie it up at 7 at halftime. Miami added a field goal early in the fourth quarter to take a 10-7 lead, but momentum swung when Penn State linebacker Shane Conlan intercepted a pass from Testaverde and returned it 38 yards to the Miami 5. D.J. Dozier would then score on a six-yard run to give Penn State its first lead of the night at 14-10.
The score would remain unchanged until Miami took over at its own 23 with just over 3 minutes left. Testaverde was masterful on the drive, converting a key 4th-and-six pass from Miami's own 27 to Brian Blades for a 31-yard gain and at one point completing six straight passes on the drive to take the Canes all the way down to the Penn State 6 with just 18 seconds remaining in the game. But on the next play, Penn State fooled Testaverde when the Lions decided to drop eight men back in pass coverage and rushed just three. Testaverde failed to read the coverage and his pass was intercepted at the goal line by linebacker Pete Giftopoulos, sealing the upset win for Penn State.
Miami dominated the game statistically, racking up 445 total yards and 22 first downs to just 162 yards and 8 first downs for Penn State. But in the end, it was Penn State that walked away with the victory--and the national championship--in this "Game of the Century."
[edit] 1993 Florida State vs. Notre Dame
November 13, 1993: In a matchup of unbeatens, Florida State University was ranked Number 1, and Notre Dame was ranked Number 2. The winner of this game, at Notre Dame Stadium in South Bend, Indiana, was certain to play Number 3 Nebraska (which would then move up to Number 2) in the Orange Bowl for the National Championship.
Florida State had quarterback Charlie Ward, who would win the Heisman Trophy. Notre Dame was an underdog, but had the home-field advantage and the Notre Dame mystique on its side. They also had the mystique of having played in so many great games, including the 1946 and 1966 "Games of the Century."
It was a game between the most-hyped program of the era and the most-hyped program in college football history, and NBC, which had exclusive rights to Fighting Irish home games (and was thus mocked by some as the "Notre Dame Broadcasting Company," much as CBS was ripped as the "Cowboys Broadcasting System" by Dallas Cowboys-haters in the 1970s and 1980s), tried to market this matchup as the "Game of the Century." There was considerable media discussion as to whether the game would live up to the hype, and, if not, how bad NBC would look. ESPN would also hype the game, showing FSU players touring the Notre Dame campus that week wearing green hats with shamrocks and gold-embroidered FSU initials on the front, and having the first on-campus edition of College GameDay from South Bend. The Peacock Network did not have to worry, because they got the classic they hoped for.
The Irish appeared to be riding those mystiques the entire game, leading 31-17 as the Seminoles got the ball with 1:39 to play. But Ward drove the 'Noles down the field, and hit Kez McCorvey on 4th-and-20 for a touchdown that bounced off Irish safety Brian McGee. Notre Dame got the ball back, but went three-and-out, giving FSU one last shot. In just three plays, they got to the Irish 14 with three seconds to play. Ward rolled out and had a wide open receiver in the end zone, but did not see him, and his pass was batted down. Notre Dame won, 31-24, and a sellout crowd stormed the field.
The Irish were now Number 1, and set up to play Number 2 Nebraska in the Orange Bowl, leaving now-Number 3 Florida State in a lesser bowl. All Notre Dame had to do was beat Boston College the next week. But BC won on a last-second field goal, and the Irish were knocked out of the top spot. Nebraska advanced to Number 1 and Florida State to Number 2, and their National Championship showdown was set. Ironically, having blown potential National Championships by missing last-second field goals in their games against the University of Miami in each of the two previous seasons, Florida State won the game, 18-16, after hitting a last-minute field goal and Nebraska's miss of a last-second field goal try. After several close calls in the Bobby Bowden era, Seminole fans finally had their first National Championship. Cornhusker fans, having had several close calls since their last title in 1971, would have to wait one more year. Fighting Irish fans still burn over this one, claiming that they should have been given the Orange Bowl berth because of their win over FSU, even though their one loss was worse to unranked Boston College, than Florida State's one loss to top-five Notre Dame was. West Virginia also believes they got slighted, believing that the chain of succession that the Mountaineers beat Boston College, who beat Notre Dame, who beat Florida State was sufficient enough to land them in the Orange Bowl. West Virginia did get a spot in the USF&G Sugar Bowl, where they lost to Florida (who lost to Florida State) by a score of 41-7.
[edit] External links
- The Game of the Century at Cumberland University.
- [3] 1966 Michigan State vs. Notre Dame
