general neyland and frank thomas had alabama and tennessee as the 2 best teams east of the mississippi river most years. in those days the winner of that game would win the national title much of the time. paul bryant played during this era. when he became the kentucky coach gen neyland was still at tennessee. coach bryant won an S.E.C. championship while at kentucky. he went 9-1 that year with his only loss coming to neyland and tenn.. that team was number 2 in the country and beat number one okla in a bowl game, but the loss to tenn.. kept him from an undefeated season. his record at kentucky against tenn.. was 1-6. rememmber this-- alabama did not play the cow-college when bryant played for bama. the cow-college game never meant as much to him as the tenn. game did. he was determined that even though he could not dominate tenn. at kentucky, he was going to do it at alabama and he did. he tough us to make it our biggest game.
now fast forward to stallings who learned it from bryant and then carry that over to the fat-ass phil era and the hatred begin. this made it stay a big game. for the younger folks this is beginning to wear off and i can understand why. L.S.U. is saban's big game, just like tennessee was bryants, but to us old codgers tennessee will always be a game that means more than your average win.
md
now fast forward to stallings who learned it from bryant and then carry that over to the fat-ass phil era and the hatred begin. this made it stay a big game. for the younger folks this is beginning to wear off and i can understand why. L.S.U. is saban's big game, just like tennessee was bryants, but to us old codgers tennessee will always be a game that means more than your average win.
md
