Without rivalries, football would be little more than (mostly) fit men scampering around a well-manicured lawn in tight pants chasing a ball no bigger than an obese Chihuahua. Dubious, at best.
Rivalries, however, give us conflict, lend intrigue and substantiate purpose.
Who were the Hatfield’s without the McCoy’s? Dirty hillbillies, that’s who.
The 2004 Red Sox World Series win wouldn’t have been nearly as memorable if the road to the championship hadn’t included a historic run through the New York Yankees and a bloody, sweat-soaked sock.
Ricky “the Dragon” Steamboat fought epic, timeless battles against Ric Flair in the days of the NWA, back when it was acceptable to have a wrestler embrace the persona of a dragon.
You get the idea.
With that in mind, I introduce you to college football’s rivalry week, an enduring testament to competition, exemplified. And in terms of college football rivalry, it gets no better than Saturday’s matchup between Albany and Stony Brook.
The Seawolves, who are 6-0 and leading the Big South, started off 2011 with three straight losses. Since their last blast in the teeth from Brown, however, they’ve reeled off 8 straight victories, including a season-signature walloping of Gardner-Webb, 76-28.
Last week against Liberty, quarterback Kyle Essington was his usual, efficient self, protecting the ball with tenacity of a mother bear guarding her cubs, going 14 of 20 for 250 yards, with three scores and nary an interception to be found. This Saturday against the rival Great Danes, however…
Okay, you know what?
I’m making all of this up. Well, to be fair, I’m not making it up—these are real teams, those are real stats and they really are playing one another this weekend—RIVALRY! But you don’t care (unless you went to either one of these schools, and in which case, I say, huh? Whatever brings you here?). The real story this weekend is the battle between good and evil, light and dark, the Drinker and the Stinker.
In the shadow of the gigantic Arrowhead scoreboard (which seems unlikely, as this game will be played under the cover of darkness), Missouri will battle Kansas in one last chance at supremacy, with nothing but a hundred years of hatred on the line. Though blood has been spilled, families decimated and dreams of slave-ownership crushed like so many rotten tomatoes, this rivalry, both historic and tragic, will reach its climactic conclusion on Saturday night.
Unless you’ve been living under a weathered 19th century headstone, you know that Mizzou is heading to the SEC and KU? Well, after this season, they may just disband that football team and count their losses, once and for final.
Kansas is bad. Powerful bad, as it were, and against a modestly adequate Missouri Tigers football squad, they don’t stand a chance.
There’s a lot to be said about heart, spirit, intensity, and that pesky old “rivalry” school-of-thought. It’s virtually a scientific fact that one always plays twice as hard against a divisional opponent (just ask the Chargers, a few weeks ago against the lowly Chiefs), but all of the back-breaking hatred in the world isn’t enough to carry the Jayhawks to victory over a substantially superior Tigers’ team.
See if I’m wrong.
If recent history is any indication, the Tigers will soundly trounce their border-adversaries, 128-3. If the Hawks have an ounce of moxie within their hollow bones, it may be 55-10.
Regardless, it is my firm prediction that this classic battle between good and evil, light and dark—well, you know the rest—will end in a decidedly unspectacular manner. Imagine the confederates driving an M1-A1 straight into the fray, a drunken Gary Pinkel poised precariously on the half-track.
For KU, it just doesn’t seem fair.
Turner Gill went into the battle with a powder-loaded hand cannon; he’ll come out in pieces.
Farewell, rivalry; you were fun while you lasted.
I just wonder what all of those goofy mu fans are going to instead of trolling the KC Star story message boards everytime something happens to KU. I mean once mu is gone, bye bye, no one will care or respond to their jealous whiney comments. MU fans dont get any of that SEC money, mu fans dont get much…. but mu fans lose a fun rivalry… and I will admit as a KU fan I have enjoyed spewing insults and hate at my Big 12 brothers…… but now it is over…..
Much like when the scumbag brother-in-law divorces your sister….. it all ends after that.
Much like a 2 cat household where the two cats hate each other and constantly hiss and fight… biut when one of the cats dies, the other cat realizes how much it misses all the good time fights…….. but KU will still our Big 12 brothers out west, we still KSU… but poor mu…who will they have? …it is kind of sad…. but they did to themselves with thier own insecurity. mu fans have not thought this through.
As a KU fan I expect a lopsided mu victory today…. BUT!!!! I MUTHAFUCKIN KNEW THAT would fucking happen the second the morons at my school decided to fire the fatman… FireCoach Mangino?? WTF??!!??….I said the moment it happened…. WHY THE HELL WOULD YOU FIRE THE FATMAN!!!??? SO WHAT IF HE WAS MEAN TO THE KIDS??!!! HE WAS WINNER!!! …. and I know it will be a while before the Mangino curse is lifted…. so I dont care if we lose today…. if we still had Mangino……. ah anyway……..
KU Basketball season is here…… and we look a lot better than people thought we would. ROCK CHALK JAYHAWK
PS
OK.. time to watch LSU……
ROCK CHALK JAYHAWK = 26 POINTS = FREE MONEY!!!
I took the 26 points and made money on KU…. so much for a smack down…. 10-3 at halftime…nice
BYE BYE mu thanks for the parting gift….and oh yeah, leave the other 20 million and get he fuck outta here.
Ry aint so sly…gill had his fill….ku is worst in america
If not for franklin giviing 10 points it would have been a massacre. And to the jayhawk faithful
(ALL 1000 OF THEM AT ARROWHEAD) it was. They walked or should i say squirmed out of
arrowhead like the quitters and losers they are.
Worst than beeing the worst team in america…they quit. They quit in the 3rd quarter.
They are quitters and losers those ku players. I heard they quit earlier in the season
but they quit in the half time of this game. You can’t teach guts and courage and ku
had neither.
As to leaving…thank god because we don’t need cupcakes like ku. Actually ku was probably
the worst team mu played this year. and they quit…quitters and losers.
And ry….get no action on saturday night. Posting on kcc at midnight on saturday. Jacking off
thinking about bill self and his irrelevant bball team. Get a date ry…get a life buddy…or you
end up like the rest of the gayhawks up there in low rents.
We win…we’re the better team. and hopefully there will be no more border wars. The game
in the second half was rather broing since the hawks gave up to head back to low rent.
Maybe ku can hire another coach. Good luck with that. But saturday I saw the worst team
ever in big 12/ncaa history lose after giving up on their teammates.
Now for little billy self”ish” and his bball team. We all saw how bad he looked. His team means
nothing to the university or to the ncaa. Noone care unless you live in south johnson county…topeka (with
the westboro folks)…lenexa….or eudora. Basketb all means nothing and little billys ego was bruised when
noone asked him about realighnment. Why? Noone care about basketball. So billy got unhinged about playing
mu again. Actually the move by mu is a killer for ku. They really liked playing tournaments at sprint center.
Was good for their huge fan base in kc and surrounding areas. Now we saw they canclled the womens
tournament contract in kc…and probably will doe the same with the mens now that missouri is gone.
We’re headed to sec. Big money…big expsoure…big step up from the backward loser quitters at
kansas.
They are a disgrace to the state of kansas. Please disband the team. They are losers. They are
quitters ….they make people cringe.
Now ry….maybe work on getting a date or a girl instead of posting at midnight on a saturday night.
IN OTHER WORDS…JUST LIKE THE REST OF THE KU FANS…YOU ALL NEED TO GET A LIFE.
GET A DATE RY…MAYBE GO ONLINE. YOU ARE LOSER #1!
ry…glaze can give you some tips…
see if you tag behind glaze for a night. He’ll give you some tips on talking with girls. Obviously you have
no social life (posting at midnight on kcc…wow..what a loser!)
You have no girl…no partner (well maybe you do have a partner…since lawrence is famous for
tht lifestyle)….no life…
get off the keyboard and get a date loser.
typical jayhawk fan….pounding the keyboard on saturday night instead of pounding some chick.
maybe he’s one of those “guys” that lawrence is famous for….
huh?
Geeeez what an idiot this harley douche is, what is he talking about?
KU covered the spread, it was not a blow out,
I have a feeling if KU had won, harley would still be here saying the same things