Gators-’Noles rivalry best in the past tense.
Hello, my name is George and I’m in denial.
It’s Rivalry Weekend in college football and I am stoked for the Florida-Florida State game. #Excited!
The Swamp Things are hosting those Smelly Seminoles Saturday at high noon! The ’Noles are gonna tomahawk themselves some Gator fillets!
It doesn’t matter which team you love or loathe. This is an epic college football rivalry, one for the ages from Bobby Bowden and Steve Spurrier to Jimbo Fisher and Urban Meyer.
Seminole fans got a hoot of Jimbo taking down Urban 31-7 in 2010, a loss so painful that Meyer quit so he could spend more time with his family until ESPN called and Urban decided he liked to spend more time with Chris Fowler and Desmond Howard just a little bit more.
Anyway, we digress. We are in the here and now, the moment just before kickoff, as another epic chapter will unfold, as Lee Corso, Kirk Herbstreit and the rest of the College Game Day crew come to Gainesville to …
Oops. My bad. The Seminoles stink. The Gators stink even more. Why do you think this game is at noon, competing with the likes of Teen Titans Go! on the Cartoon Network and Rosanne reruns on TV Land ?
Reruns would be perfect for this FSU-UF game because the Gators aren’t good enough to qualify for a marginal bowl and the ’Noles are in pathetic mode, having to beat Florida (will do) and Louisiana-Monroe (yawn) just to score an invite to the Nobody Is Interested Bowl.
We very much would love to dial back the clock and remember the good times. George in Denial is here to help.
Let’s hop on the waaayback time machine to the fall of 1996 when the Gators lost a contentious regular-season game to the ’Noles in Tallahassee. FSU players celebrated by holding a stuffed alligator with a spear spiked in its midsection. A fan held a sign that said: “Spurrier Highest Paid Choke in America.”
But as Mr. Corso loves to say: Not so fast, my friend.
The Gators, through unfortunate circumstances involving other teams, worked their way back into the national-championship picture and faced the ’Noles in a rematch in the Sugar Bowl for the title.
Spurrier wasn’t happy with the way the ’Noles knocked around quarterback Danny Wuerffel in the first game, and said as much in a very Spurrierqesue way, harping on late hits and Bowden’s coaching philosophy.
Maybe the mind games worked: Florida won 52-20 and returned to Gainesville with a national-championship trophy.
Not to worry, Seminoles fans, we got a little something for you, too. A tie that was so sweet it acquired a nickname “The Choke at the Doak.” We’re going back to 1994 now. The Gators had this one bagged, leading 31-3 heading into the fourth quarter at Doak Campbell Stadium. But the Seminoles scored four touchdowns in less than 13 minutes to come away with a 31-31 tie.
Your turn, Gators. It’s 1997 now, and Spurrier, ever the mad scientist with a clipboard, went with alternating quarterbacks Doug Johnson and Noah Brindise on nearly every play. The top-ranked Seminoles, dazed and confused, lost 32-29.
And that’s just a few snapshots from this frenzied game of football pingpong involving two programs that have met as top-10 opponents 14 times and have combined for six national titles since 1993.
Rumor has it they are playing for soda pop and a pizza party on Saturday: “Great job today, Jimmie and Danny, and here’s a slice of pepperoni!”
I will have no rooting interest. But I’d be lying if I told you I didn’t want those programs to rise up again. I don’t care if the next Gators coach is Chip Kelly or Kelly Clarkson. I don’t care if Jimbo has turned down LSU to FSU.
Coaches undoubtedly help make for contentious relationships and rivalries (see Bowden, Spurrier), but the end game involves dominant players.
Rustle up a few of those in Tallahassee and Gainesville, and wake us all up from this dreadful existence of two great programs playing very bad football.