|
|
 |
 |   |
|
EVENTS Fantasy Central Inside Game Video Plus Statitudes Your Turn Message Boards Email Newsletters Golf Guide Cities 
CNNSI.com GROUP
COMMERCE | |
A War in Dixie
In their book A War in Dixie: Alabama v. Auburn, (HarperCollins, $25, available everywhere) Sports Illustrated's Ivan Maisel and USA Today's Kelly Whiteside reveal the passions and the pressures that have made the Alabama-Auburn rivalry the most feverish in the nation. Both head coaches -- Tommy Tuberville and Mike DuBose, in his last game at Alabama's helm -- opened their doors to meetings, practices, film study, team meals and every other activity as their teams prepared for the 2000 Iron Bowl. As the Crimson Tide and Tigers gather for this year's edition, take a look back at the mood on both campuses last season on the Day Before. AlabamaMike DuBose arrives at his office a few minutes after 8:30 a.m., later than usual. He finds two gifts waiting for him -- one is a Beanie Baby, with a beatific smile, closed eyes, and hands clasped in prayer. It is named Hope. A woman in the athletic department has left him a leatherbound copy of the former inspirational bestseller Tough Times Don't Last, Tough People Do, by Dr. Robert Schiller. DuBose puts the book on his desk and takes an admiring glance at it. The office no longer looks like his. The brick wall behind him, which had been adorned by large framed photographs of his family, is bare. Friday mornings are a time of reflection for a football staff. The game plan is in. The players have been coached on the field. For DuBose, it's not just any Friday morning; it's his last day in his office. Perhaps that's the reason, when asked about the rivalry, that he feels unbound to say what he believes. Or it might be his newfound passion for his religion. Whatever the reason, he sits behind his desk and says what few officials connected to the game will say publicly. "It's the kind of game I didn't enjoy playing in," DuBose says. "The game is never over. You kept repeating it and repeating it and repeating it. You couldn't help but be around the fans. It's never over until you play it again the next year. It's a great game. But it's a game. For too many people, it's been their life, their goal. I don't want to diminish the significance of the game. It should be big. But it's still a game. There are families that can split over it. There are people that die over it. If we had that kind of passion for serving God and for taking care of our families, this would be a much better place. There are things that are bigger and more complicated. We need to understand that." DuBose's lack of enjoyment stems from his sophomore season at Alabama. In 1972, he played on the team that lost to Auburn, 17-16, in the "Punt Bama Punt" game. He played defense when the Tigers drove for their only offensive points, the field goal that pulled Auburn within 16-3. "It was very difficult to go home," DuBose says. "Opp [his hometown in southeast Alabama] is probably a little more for Auburn. There's so much agriculture. That may have something to do with the way I feel about it. That [1972] game, today, is still being played. I didn't play a lot. I had gotten hurt two weeks before. I didn't practice at all. I didn't start in 'seventy-two. But I played. I was in the drive that Auburn kicked a field goal. I didn't play well in that drive. I don't know if it was because I was not getting as much work. When it comes down to five, six, seven plays that decide a game, especially in that game, [if] I did something in that game, maybe Auburn wouldn't have that opportunity. That's the one they remember. The play you didn't make. Defensively, we only gave up three points. Still, three points is the difference between winning and losing. The objective is to win. If they score 17, you got to find a way to score 18. If we score three, we got to find a way to let them score 2." ...
"You don't even want to get too close to the enemy, as far as having feelings," Rouzie says. "This game is an emotional one. That's the way I feel about it. It's a war. That's what I do. It's a war. You are going out there to compete for the same players. You are going out there to sell your program. You're lining up against them every day and competing. You're just not on the football field. That's the way I look at it. Those guys are very competitive. Just because we're not lined up on the field, it doesn't make any difference." After practice one evening this week, DuBose said he didn't believe the outcome of the game had much effect on recruiting. "I don't know that it's ever had the impact that people think it would have," DuBose says. "Auburn and Alabama go head to head on very few guys. The game doesn't play a significance from that standpoint. The young men are making decisions based on opportunity to play, academic evaluation." When the premise is presented to Rouzie, he gives a succinct assessment. "That's bulls---," he says. "If there's a top-ranked player, we're both looking. You got to win the majority of those instate battles. That's your ball team. It's critical. For somebody to say that, it's not. Certain kids grow up Alabama fans and certain kids are Auburn fans. But you're going to recruit the heck out of them. In a state our size, when it comes down to ten or twelve kids [who can play Division I-A football], you better get your share. Coach Bryant said, 'I can get all the coaches I want that can do X's and O's. Ninety-eight percent of the game is recruiting, and don't forget it.'" ... It's a testament to the staying power of friendship -- or perhaps the bonds of matrimony -- that a smattering of Auburn hats and parkas can be seen at the Alabama pep rally. The police closed off traffic on University Boulevard at 5:30 p.m. A large stage has been erected in a parking lot adjacent to the Sigma Nu house on University Boulevard. A couple of morning "radio personalities" introduce the emcee of the rally, Ken Stabler, the former Alabama quarterback who is now the analyst on the radio broadcast of the games. "The season starts tomorrow," Stabler declares. He implores the crowd to greet Auburn fans with courtesy and kindness. His civility is impressive, until he finishes the thought. Alabama fans should greet Auburn with courtesy and kindness, Stabler says, because "we gon' beat their ass on the field tomorrow." AuburnTommy Tuberville is relaxed, as usual, as he sits in his office answering some e-mails. His new contract rests on his desk, unsigned. "I'll sign it before the game in case we lose," he jokes. A few of the coaches, carrying garment bags, shut their office doors and walk across the street where the buses are idling in front of Sewell Hall, the dorm which houses most of the younger players. Don Dunn lags behind. He pauses in the lobby of the athletic complex and makes a detour into the Lovelace Athletic Museum to pay his respects to ghosts of the past. When asked if he does this every week before a game, he says, "No, because this isn't any other week." Inside the museum, Pat Sullivan's 1971 Heisman Trophy is immediately on the left. A video of Auburn athletic highlights, nearly all of them football, runs continuously on a large screen in the center of the room. A clip from a 1960 Rat Pack movie Ocean's 11 is included. "I've got great news for you, " a woman gushes in the clip. "Auburn beat Alabama by twelve points. " There are pictures of Fob James, an All-American halfback for Auburn in 1955, who was elected to his first term as governor in 1978. There is a Camel cigarette case which was given to students trying out for the football team in 1947. There is a box full of tickets from the 1905 season. There is a 1937 football playbook. There is a recreation of Toomer's Corner, complete with a rolled tree. There is toilet paper salvaged from a tree after the first Auburn-Alabama game at Jordan-Hare in 1989. There is a toilet paper roll from Toomer's which graced a family's Christmas tree for years before being donated to the museum. There are life-sized dioramas of Pat Sullivan talking with Coach Shug Jordan, both looking eerily like the real thing. There are also life-sized mannequins of Pat Dye, Bo Jackson, Charles Barkley, and Frank Thomas. ...
"What's the difference between a maggot and Alabama?" Byrd asks. "They've both been living off the Bear for twenty years." The troopers keep the trip interesting by bullying cars out of the caravan. When an unsuspecting motorist switches lanes into the motorcade, the troopers respond as if it's an enemy invasion. Motorcycle cops blast their sirens, surround the intruder, and force him to switch lanes. "Get your ass outta here," Byrd yells. "Some drivers are just crazier than a runover dog." The motorcycle troopers speed ahead of the motorcade to block off incoming traffic. Throughout the journey, they radio each other traffic play-by-play. When Bus No. 2 is too far behind Bus No. 1, they radio bus driver No. 2 and ask him to speed it up. And so the drive goes, north on 65, past a billboard which reads: IF YOU DON'T GO TO CHURCH, THE DEVIL WILL GET YOU. A devil with a pitchfork looks down menacingly from the sign. When the team buses arrive at the Sheraton Perimeter Park South in Birmingham, the Tigers are greeted by the lights of TV cameras and the photo flash from fans. The music of "Let's Get Ready to Rumble" from Jock Jams blasts from the speakers as the Tigers walk through the lobby. For Alex Lincoln, the scene is nothing like Division III Mississippi College, where he spent his first two seasons. "When I was growing up that's how I pictured college football," says Lincoln, who turned twenty-three today. "A lot of movies glamorize it, about staying in all these real expensive hotels, and sometimes, you know, maybe it's different in Alabama, but we don't always have a good hotel. When we're playing in Starkville, Mississippi, they don't have any of those five-star hotels around there. Coming in here and being in a nice place, people playing music and reporters everywhere, that's how I see college football. Man, I just got so excited. I just can't imagine how it can get any better, and I know it is going to be ten times that tomorrow. I had a ball. I didn't want to go to my room. I wanted to stay in the lobby. I was like a big kid there. That's how I was, growing up. When I would look at a football player, I would stand in the corner looking starstruck." Rob Pate smiles as he remembers the first time Lincoln went to an away game with the team. "I just remember how excited he was just to get on the plane for his first road trip," Pate says. "It was a big deal for him. Better than the game. We're sitting on the sidelines and he was saying, 'I get to go on the plane again.' It was a lot of fun for him. I think a lot of times you take things for granted and then a guy like Alex comes along and you know how special it is.' As Cole Cubelic got off the bus, a fan yelled, "Roll Tide." Cubelic is still fuming about the comment. "It's stuff like that that really makes you want to go there and win badly. Obnoxious people like that don't have any business even being at this hotel, much less saying that in front of eighty SEC football players for the other team," he says. Good thing Cubelic didn't look in the men's bathroom just inside the lobby. Scribbled on one stall was this prediction: "Alabama 28, Auburn 27." Earlier in the week, Cubelic tried to get in contact with Alabama offensive guard Griff Redmill, whom he's met a few times, and backup quarterback Tyler Watts. Cubelic doesn't know if either got his message, because neither returned his phone call. "I was just gonna tell them, 'I know exactly what you are going through and if you want to talk about it,"' Cubelic says. In 1998, Auburn faced similar turmoil, when the Tigers lost their coach, Terry Bowden, and far too many games, finishing 3-8.
"Obviously when things don't go your way, you're gonna make changes. Then you start to lose games and then everybody wants to fire your coach. When everybody is talking about your coach getting fired all the time, you don't think about playing football. "I can remember some team meetings we had and some guys pointing fingers and that type of things. I'm sure that they are seeing some of the same stuff. I've heard rumors, but I don't know for sure -- probably won't ever know. But I know we had a lot of 'You need to do this' and 'That's your fault' and stuff like that. That never helps, especially when you are not winning games that you should be winning." Before dinner, the Reverend Chette Williams talks to the team about finishing strong and reminisces about the Iron Bowl of his senior year, in 1984. "We were 8-3. Alabama was 4-6. We had the best running back in the nation, Bo Jackson. The defense was awesome. We had a quarterback who was experienced, who the players believed in and trusted in. We came in with a lot of confidence. At the start, we drove it right down the field and scored a touchdown. But then they scored, and after that you could just kind of see the emotion start to change. You could see their senior leadership and their players pushing them, you could start seeing them build confidence, and you could see us relaxing, because we were expected to win. The bottom line is, we lost that game. We lost that game not because we weren't physically able to win that game. We lost that game [17-15] because of mental mistakes. Bo went the wrong way on a play, but the game wasn't lost by Bo Jackson. The game was lost because our team, we didn't finish strong. If I had to have a theme for this evening, it's finish strong." From the book A War in Dixie by Ivan Maisel and Kelly Whiteside. Copyright © 2001 by Ivan Maisel and Kelly Whiteside. Published by HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. Reprinted with permission. All rights reserved.
|
