What a Celebration!
It’s Championship Game Day! What a great experience for the guys at Alabama and Texas. A day neither will ever forget, although only one team will look back fondly on tonight’s result. It makes me wonder how Notre Dame’s players reflect on the 1981 Sugar Bowl. They are probably still wondering how in the world they lost to the Georgia Bulldogs.
The other night, the halftime show of the Orange Bowl featured Kool and the Gang, one of my favorite groups from back in the day. One of the songs they played was Celebration, one of their biggest hits. I am sure their sales have spiked since Tuesday night.
From Wikipedia: “Celebration” is a song released in 1980 by Kool & the Gang from their album Celebrate!. It reached number one on the Billboard Hot 100chart on February 7, 1981 and held that position until February 20, 1981. Late in 1980, the song had also reached number one on both the Billboard Dance and R&B charts.
I was listening to the tape during pregame in the locker room.
I was focused on the portion of the song that said these these words:
We’re gonna have a good time tonight
Let’s celebrate, it’s all right
We’re gonna have a good time tonight
Let’s celebrate, it’s all right
Needless to say, we did have a good time that night.
Oh yeah, 2010 marks the 30 year anniversary of The Championship. Wow.
Georgia’s Biggest Rivals, Real or Imagined?
The pundits are always talking about how competitive SEC football is and how much natural rivalries play into the weekly grind. In looking at the new UGA Media Guide, I noticed some interesting tidbits. Some folks have handed it to the Dawgs, some series are competitve and some we dominate more than I realized.
Alabama has an eleven game lead in a series that until recently was very on again off again. In the olds days we rotated those teams that are now mostly SEC Western Division teams, except Auburn and Ole Miss who we played every year.
This is our record against our traditional rivals:
Alabama 25-36 -4
Auburn - 51- 53-8
Clemson-41-17-4(ACC)
Florida -47-38-2
Georgia Tech -59-37-5
Kentucky -49-11-2
LSU -12-14-1
Mississippi -30-12-1
Mississippi State -16-5-0
South Carolina - 45-14-2
Tennessee -16-20-2
Vanderbilt - 49-18-2
What jumped out at me and maybe you too is that as tough as the South Carolina series seems, it’s on par with our record against Vanderbilt. That blew me away. It’s the same way with Clemson, Kentucky and for many years Florida also. Games like this week with South Carolina always seem close, but we do dominate the Gamecocks.
The Dawgs have some work to do this week to beat South Carolina, but they can do it.
Go Dawgs!
Alabama Football is officially back.
You thought they were back when they were 12-0 going into the SEC championship Game and had a chance at playing for a National Championship like they have soo many times before. Well, The “F” had something to say about that, and Utah was another “Speed Bump” on their way to glory. Now it seems they are just a little closer to being the Alabama we all remember. I don’t like taking pokes at the opposition usually, but in reading the NCAA’s report on this ruling, where a few games were “vacated” between 2005-2007, something struck me. Read the excerpt below.
University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa
Public Infractions Report
June 11, 2009
Page No. 3
__________
Beginning in at least the 2005-06 academic year and continuing through the fall of 2007, the institution’s textbook distribution system allowed approximately 200 student-athletes to obtain impermissible textbooks and supplies, with a total retail value of approximately $40,000. Approximately $21,950 of this total was obtained by student-athletes identified by the institution as “intentional wrong doers.”
The other students were found to have purchased not only required materials, but optional materials as well. That had to be accidental, why would they buy books they didn’t have to read. Okay, on second thought, I’ll give them a pass on that one. The bottom line is only 22 athletes, 14 of which were track athletes, knowingly took advantage of the system. This really is not a huge deal, but the problem is, the NCAA had to do something because of Bama’s repeat offender status. This means major infractions occurred while on probation for previous major violations. Going back to 1995, 1999 and 2001 Alabama has been found to, let us just say, not run the tightest ship on the open seas.
I’m not going any further than that because everybody has issues from time to time.
You know for the first time in recent memory, the “F” is looking to repeat and Alabama is not.
Tell me what you really think!