# BCS Championship Game--ROLL TIDE **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Created:** [January 7, 2013, 6:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371 "2013-01-07T18:00:12Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![USCDiver](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/uscdiver/32/354_2.png) [@USCDiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/USCDiver)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2013, 10:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/61 "2013-01-08T22:04:33Z")
> [@jsc1953](#): > > I just read a stat that I haven’t confirmed, but it’s interesting if it’s true: the SEC bottom 8 teams were 0-30 this season against the top 6. Maybe you misheard, I counted 0-13. By the way, I assume that means that the opponent was in the Top 6 at the time they played because teams that lose a bunch of games don’t end up in the Top 6 at the end of the season. Either way that’s a pretty stupid and arbitrary statistic. Great teams don’t generally lose. Why use a Top 6 cut off? Why not Top 10? By contrast, I looked at the entire ACC schedule (all teams, not just the bottom of the barrel), there were about 8 games against Top 6 opponents. All but two (UGA and UF) were against FSU or ND. Only NC State had a win (against FSU). The Big 10 schedule was even worse; only Michigan (vs Alabama in Week 1) and Wisconsin (vs Stanford in Rose Bowl) even played against a Top 6 (at the time) team, both loses. Granted, that doesn’t include OSU or Penn State but the point remains. ---
**Author:** ![markdash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba8739/32.png) [@markdash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/markdash)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2013, 10:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/62 "2013-01-08T22:06:31Z")
I don’t think he means “top 6 in the rankings” but rather “the best 6 teams in the conference” which would mean Alabama, LSU, Texas A&M, Georgia, USC, and Florida. ---
**Author:** ![jsc1953](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/5daacb/32.png) [@jsc1953](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jsc1953)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2013, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/63 "2013-01-08T22:10:40Z")
> [@markdash](#): > > I don’t think he means “top 6 in the rankings” but rather “the best 6 teams in the conference” which would mean Alabama, LSU, Texas A&M, Georgia, USC, and Florida. Correct. Of course you expect the bottom tier to lose most of their games against the top tier; if they didn’t, they wouldn’t be in the bottom. But it seems like a good way to measure overall strength of the conference; or at least, balance. ---
**Author:** ![Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slow_moving_vehicle/32/291_2.png) [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slow_Moving_Vehicle)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2013, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/64 "2013-01-08T22:45:52Z")
> [@Labrador\_Deceiver](#): > > Georgia scored 22 unanswered points and won by 2 TDs vs. an 11-2 Nebraska. That game was only a negative for the Dawgs if you failed to actually watch the game. In fairness to **Oredigger** , I stopped watching that game in the 3rd quarter, because the Dawgs looked so bad and I didn’t want to watch them lose to damn Nebraska. They finally got things straightened out end, but that should have been a buttkickin’ comparable to what Alabama did to Notre Dame. Still, I think Georgia would have handled ND almost as well as 'Bama did. > [@jsc1953](#): > > Congratulations to the Tide; Nick Saban has built something awesome down there. And I hate that. I hate dynasties. > > It’s like baseball in the 1950’s, where every team was fighting for the right to lose to the Yankees. It’s just no fun. Yep, you’re absolutely right. I mean, I’m a Georgia fan and was rooting for the Tide, but I completely get the SEC-fatigue that affects the rest of the country. Seeing Alabama and Florida and LSU year after year _isn’t_ fun. I’m glad 'Bama won, but I was really hoping for an exciting, good game. I didn’t get it. > [@Labrador\_Deceiver](#): > > It’s not subverting rivalries. Trust me on this one. They are as intense as they ever were, if not more so. > > SEC fans root for SEC teams out of conference, with the usual exception of their biggest rivals. I can promise you that Bama didn’t have a lot of suppor from their Auburn brethren last night. Only half of the state of Alabama is celebrating this morning, while the other half mourns. True dat. I was very, very happy to see Florida get humiliated in the Sugar Bowl. I’ll root for The University of Al-Qaeda Fighting Pedophiles over Florida. ---
**Author:** ![USCDiver](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/uscdiver/32/354_2.png) [@USCDiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/USCDiver)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2013, 10:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/65 "2013-01-08T22:46:01Z")
Well, that does make a lot more sense. I won’t argue there aren’t a handful of crummy teams at the bottom of the SEC or mediocre teams in the middle. Hell, my beloved Gamecocks were in both those categories for a LONG time. But the same is true of any conference. I don’t think there any many, aside from True SEC Loonies, who think the bottom of the SEC is better than the top of other conferences. ---
**Author:** ![Oakminster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/77aa72/32.png) [@Oakminster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oakminster)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2013, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/66 "2013-01-08T23:29:21Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > Tell it to the Auburn tree poisoner. Rivalries within the SEC aren’t any different than rivalries anywhere else, and SEC fans only discovered this virtue a couple of years ago, which is where this whole “virtue” starts to become disingenuous. If the SEC pride thing were earnest it would be annoying, but it’s just fans boosting their own schools by the schools they beat (or the schools that beat them) are all super awesome, so their own team is obviously also super awesome. The strength of the conference is obvious, but this stuff got old quite a while ago. Oh bullshit. Cry me a freaking river. SEC pride is real, earnest, and older than you are. ---
**Author:** ![Oakminster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/77aa72/32.png) [@Oakminster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oakminster)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2013, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/67 "2013-01-08T23:30:32Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > And certainly we can all agree everybody loves Southern pride and it has no connections to anything people find unsavory. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![jsc1953](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/5daacb/32.png) [@jsc1953](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jsc1953)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2013, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/68 "2013-01-08T23:41:24Z")
> [@Slow\_Moving\_Vehicle](#): > > The University of Al-Qaeda Fighting Pedophiles I am sooo stealing this. > [@USCDiver](#): > > I don’t think there any many, aside from True SEC Loonies, who think the bottom of the SEC is better than the top of other conferences. There are a \*lot \*of True SEC Loonies out there. Perhaps not strictly “top” \< “bottom”, but you sure hear a lot of “Team X would finish 5th in the SEC West” crap, whenever there’s a discussion of any good team outside the SEC. ---
**Author:** ![Marley23](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/45deac/32.png) [@Marley23](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Marley23)\ **Post date:** [January 8, 2013, 11:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/69 "2013-01-08T23:47:18Z")
> [@Oakminster](#): > > Oh bullshit. Cry me a freaking river. I guess that’d be the famed SEC touchiness. 😉 > [@](#): > > SEC pride is real, earnest, and older than you are. Interesting that nobody else heard about it until maybe four or five years ago. And I expect we’ll stop hearing about it - not right away, but eventually - after the SEC stops winning titles every year, which has to happen at some point. I still think the entire notion is weird. The conferences are just commercial alliances. Rooting for an entire conference is like rooting for a huge corporate conglomerate because you like one of their products. ---
**Author:** ![Alex\_from\_CB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/278dde/32.png) [@Alex\_from\_CB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alex_from_CB)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2013, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/70 "2013-01-09T00:44:57Z")
Manti Teo, had the same view of most of the Bamer touchdowns as Michelangelo had of the Sistine Chapel for 20 years. He’s been renamed Boyti Teo. He needs to ship any and all trophies he received this year to Jadeveon Clowney, at South Carolina who was clearly the best defensive player in the country. With all the talk about McCarron’s girl friend what about his mother? Milf city. (In red, below) [![](http://cdn.bleacherreport.net/images_root/article/media_slots/photos/000/674/604/aj-mccarron-mom_original.jpg?1357582561) ](http://cdn.bleacherreport.net/images_root/article/media_slots/photos/000/674/604/aj-mccarron-mom_original.jpg?1357582561) [![](http://cdn.bleacherreport.net/images_root/article/media_slots/photos/000/674/607/aj-mccarron-mom-boobs-lead1_original.jpg?1357582660) ](http://cdn.bleacherreport.net/images_root/article/media_slots/photos/000/674/607/aj-mccarron-mom-boobs-lead1_original.jpg?1357582660) ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2013, 1:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/71 "2013-01-09T01:20:52Z")
> [@BobLibDem](#): > > Disgusting moment of the night: Brent Musberger drooling over the Alabama QB’s girlfriend. They had to turn the camera away from her and mop the booth, jeez Brent, you never saw a pretty girl before? She’s not even _that_ hot. ESPN just apologized for his comments, though. ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2013, 2:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/72 "2013-01-09T02:40:27Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > In that sense, yes- because it subverts the rivalries (some of which have real history and tradition) to an ever-changing and money-driven conference structure. I don’t see that as a virtue. It should be noted that while all conferences shift over time, and are money-driven (as are all aspects of college football and basketball), the SEC represents a distinct area of the country. It doesn’t have geographical absurdities like West Virginia being in the Big 12 or South Florida in the Big East. All the teams are in the Southeast. This helps give it more of a real identity. > [@Marley23](#): > > And certainly we can all agree everybody loves Southern pride and it has no connections to anything people find unsavory. …as does this. No region of the nation is as oft-insulted as the South, which encourages sticking together. > [@Slow Moving Vehicle](#): > > Seeing Alabama and Florida and LSU year after year _isn’t_ fun. On the other hand, they play the closest thing to NFL football outside the NFL. The speed and athleticism are highly entertaining to me, anyway. > [@USCDiver](#): > > I don’t think there any many, aside from True SEC Loonies, who think the bottom of the SEC is better than the top of other conferences. As a Kentucky fan, I can assure you that no one thinks our football team can beat _anyone_ of note. > [@Marley23](#): > > Interesting that nobody else heard about it until maybe four or five years ago. And I expect we’ll stop hearing about it - not right away, but eventually - after the SEC stops winning titles every year, which has to happen at some point. I still think the entire notion is weird. The conferences are just commercial alliances. Rooting for an entire conference is like rooting for a huge corporate conglomerate because you like one of their products. The article I linked to traces it to the 1924 Rose Bowl, and points out why the SEC transcends being merely a commercial alliance: it ties into a regional pride in a way other conferences do not. > [@Alex from CB](#): > > Manti Teo, had the same view of most of the Bamer touchdowns as Michelangelo had of the Sistine Chapel for 20 years. I felt bad for Notre Dame’s players as the game wore on, the effort was clearly there, but they were facing a team that’s on a different level of size, strength, and athleticism. ---
**Author:** ![pancakes3](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ba9def/32.png) [@pancakes3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pancakes3)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2013, 3:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/73 "2013-01-09T03:04:21Z")
> [@jsc1953](#): > > Congratulations to the Tide; Nick Saban has built something awesome down there. And I hate that. > > … > > And to make matters worse, there are many obnoxious SEC fans out there (present company excluded, of course) who will stifle all discussions about anything concerning college football with hoots and hollers of Roll Tide and War Eagle and Geaux Tigers (it’s interesting how everybody in the south gets to absorb the success of Alabama, through osmosis) and how everyone else in the country is completely irrelevant. And we now have to wait another year for another chance to get them to STFU. I’m pretty sure Urban Meyer is going to simmer down some SEC warcries next season, as well as introduce the usually plodding Big 10 to the forward pass. ---
**Author:** ![Ogre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ecb155/32.png) [@Ogre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ogre)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2013, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/74 "2013-01-09T03:29:28Z")
> [@Marley23](#): > > And certainly we can all agree everybody loves Southern pride and it has no connections to anything people find unsavory. Did you…did you just compare conference pride to _secessionism_? Really? Stop this, Marley. You’re better than this. > [@](#): > > Interesting that nobody else heard about it until maybe four or five years ago. And I expect we’ll stop hearing about it - not right away, but eventually - after the SEC stops winning titles every year, which has to happen at some point. The only reason you haven’t heard about it until recently is because you haven’t been listening. SEC pride is very, very real, and it predates your time frame by a long way. I’m 41 years old, and when I was growing up, my father, a staunch football fan, used to tell me that he rooted for any SEC team over any out-of-conference team every time. This was in the 1970’s, and the idea was not new then either, nor was it isolated in my family. Everyone I knew talked like this. The only possible exceptions were in-state rivals (Auburn in our case) and Tenne-goddamn-see. And EVEN THEN, the strictures would be relaxed more often than not, depending on recent history. It began a long, long time ago. It began, arguably, when Alabama faced the biggest, baddest team in the nation, Washington, in the 1926 Rose Bowl. This was a chance to strike back at Reconstruction, against H.L. Mencken writing articles in Boston about the small cranial capacity of the average Southerner. Against all the contempt that had been piled upon Southerners’ heads by the national media. Alabama literally carried the honor of the entire South with them to Pasadena. It was _specifically_ pitched that way to the players and the rest of the region, and supporters from all over the South flocked to the Alabama football team like mad. And Alabama WON. After the game, during the train ride home, the team was stopped in virtually every town in the South by huge, jubilant crowds. Look, you may pooh-pooh that game and the Southern reaction to that game as ancient, irrelevant history, but if you do, be aware that this is why Southerners say that you don’t understand what football means down here. Every year, to this day, I hear the story of the 1926 Rose Bowl. It’s told in barber shops, restaurants, and football games every single year, and it always will be. That game changed the South. You may laugh at that, but it’s true nonetheless, and its memory fuels the cultural impact of college football throughout the entire region to the present day. And as long as Southerners hear about how backward the South is, about how we’re ignorant rednecks, about how, when you hear our accents, you can’t help but think we’re dumb, about how we’re poor and recidivist and bible-beating red-staters, and how could anybody live there because it’s so primitive and hot anyway, it’s going to make us mad. That goes for liberals and conservatives, white and black, rich and poor. And we’re going to strike back, at least partially, through football. Until you understand that, you should never, ever pretend to understand what football means to the South. And if all that amuses you, or makes you think even worse about us, congratulations. You’ve just fueled the fire even more. We’re past begging for approval. Now we just want to beat you. And we will. ---
**Author:** ![Ogre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ecb155/32.png) [@Ogre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ogre)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2013, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/75 "2013-01-09T03:32:42Z")
> [@pancakes3](#): > > I’m pretty sure Urban Meyer is going to simmer down some SEC warcries next season, as well as introduce the usually plodding Big 10 to the forward pass. Keep dreaming. If Urban Meyer beats an SEC team next year for the title, it will have precisely the opposite effect you think it will have. The entire South will look at it like it’s a form of oppression, and we won’t stop until we’re back on top. That’s the way it works here. Alabama listened to so much “Your time is over! Alabama will never be back on top! The Bear is dead, losers!” bullshit. SO much. You see what all that accomplished. It’s very much like an insurgency, actually. ---
**Author:** ![Ogre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ecb155/32.png) [@Ogre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ogre)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2013, 3:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/76 "2013-01-09T03:44:14Z")
Here’s a Mark Childress [article](http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323874204578218001541258488.html) in the Wall Street Journal that attempts to explain it. And the comment by Robert Gualaty that says, “As long as Bama fans and grads get me my fries in under 2 minutes while they’re still hot, they can have whatever football culture they want.”? That shit is EXACTLY what I’m talking about. “Catholics vs. Cousins”? “Golden Domers vs. Mobile Homers”? Yep. ---
**Author:** ![Human\_Action](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/ac91a4/32.png) [@Human\_Action](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Human_Action)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2013, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/77 "2013-01-09T03:54:20Z")
> [@Ogre](#): > > And the comment by Robert Gualaty that says, “As long as Bama fans and grads get me my fries in under 2 minutes while they’re still hot, they can have whatever football culture they want.”? That shit is EXACTLY what I’m talking about. In certain circles, Southerners are expected to a) hate themselves, or at least acknowledge their inferiority, and b) fail at everything. When they don’t, feathers become ruffled. ---
**Author:** ![markdash](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/ba8739/32.png) [@markdash](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/markdash)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2013, 3:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/78 "2013-01-09T03:59:02Z")
So it’s really just a proxy for continuing the Civil War, then? ---
**Author:** ![Sauron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ce7236/32.png) [@Sauron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sauron)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2013, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/79 "2013-01-09T04:03:22Z")
**Ogre** , those posts were wonderful. Because I’m a Southerner, and therefore incapable of understanding or properly executing a polite golf clap, please allow me to recognize your brilliance with an understated and tasteful “YEEEEHAWWWW!” ---
**Author:** ![Ogre](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ecb155/32.png) [@Ogre](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ogre)\ **Post date:** [January 9, 2013, 4:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371/80 "2013-01-09T04:08:26Z")
> [@markdash](#): > > So it’s really just a proxy for continuing the Civil War, then? No, it’s mutated quite a bit by this point. Southern football has been completely, enthusiastically integrated by now. That by itself would be enough to falsify your Civil War idea. By now, it’s more of a reaction to the generalized condescension poured upon the South by outsiders. It’s still PC to make fun of rednecks and country folk. The first thing I heard when I moved to DC a few years ago was, “Gosh, you actually grew up in Alabama? I’ve never met anybody who grew up in Alabama! Where’s your accent? Did you go to college?” :rolleyes: You know what? We don’t like that. Just, you know, FYI. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/bcs-championship-game-roll-tide/646371.md?page=5)