Tomorrow’s football game between Mississippi State and Alabama has generated a
lot of anticipation, and well it should. Both teams are undefeated heading into
the contest. Mississippi State, at 7-0 for the first time since Moses crossed
the Red Sea. For Alabama, also at 7-0, this is somewhat familiar territory. Again ranked as
the top team in the nation, expectations are that the Tide will find a way to
turn back the Bulldogs in their quest for immortality. If this scenario sounds somewhat familiar, it is. Way back
in 1980, Alabama was also 7-0 and ranked number one in the nation. On November 1st (All Saints Day), Alabama
rolled into Jackson expecting to continue their march to a national
championship behind a powerful wishbone offense led by Bama quarterback Don
Jacobs that had generated up to 300 yards per game thus far. Alabama had won
twenty-eight straight games, and had earned two conference championships and
two national championships in the process. Bear Bryant’s boys had been ranked
as the top team in the nation all season long.
Mississippi State came into the game with a 6-2 record.
Opening with three wins over Memphis State, Louisiana Tech and Vanderbilt,
State was upset by the Florida Gators on September 27. Beating Illinois the
next week, the Dogs suffered a humiliating 42-14 loss to USM the week after and
then won two straight over Miami and Auburn. Coach Emory Bellard’s team, led by
freshman quarterback John Bond (left), a native of Starkville, came into the Bama game
ranked #13. Although both teams were good, few expected the upstart Bulldogs to
win that day. After all, it was Alabama, which had beaten Mississippi State
twenty-two times in a row, and it was Bear Bryant. At this point, the story
becomes personal for me.
The sports editor for the Natchez Democrat at the time was a
cousin of mine. With most folks in Natchez more interested in the Ole Miss-LSU
game that day (which the Tigers won 38-16, by the way), I was asked to cover
the Mississippi State-Alabama game. I gladly (although nervously) accepted.
Since I had covered football games in high school for my school newspaper, I at
least had some rudimentary knowledge of the game. However, I was woefully
unprepared for the task ahead. Back then, of course, there were no laptops and
certainly no internet (as a freshman at Millsaps I took a course in BASIC, but
that was all I or anyone else knew about computers at the time). Sportswriters
either wrote their stories out by hand or pecked them out on a typewriter and
then called in the story. Even Video Display Terminals (or VDTs), a device which
revolutionized newsrooms, were still a couple of years out. When I arrived at the
stadium, I used my press pass *(above, right) to go up to the press box and took my place among
the real sportswriters. I was in awe, in high cotton, and way out of my league. The game, to be honest, is a blur now. What I remember most is that
someone brought food around at some point, and that folks kept handing us
mimeograph sheets with up-to-date stats throughout the game. While I did my
best to write a story that would pass for a newspaper article, let’s just say
that I flubbed it completely, and in the end the Natchez Democrat had to
reconstruct the biggest game in the nation that day from wire reports. In the
long run, it was the greatest gift I could have gotten, because it cured me
once and for all from ever wanting to be a sportswriter. To this day, I have nothing
but admiration for all those who cover sporting events. The tools might have
changed, but the pressure is still there to get the story right and on time,
and it’s often a thankless job. 
Mississippi State won that day, of course, 6-3. Alabama’s
offense was held to only 116 yards on the ground and 64 passing yards. Neither
team was able to score a touchdown, although in the final drive it sure looked
as if the Crimson Tide would punch it in and preserve their championship
season. With the ball on the MSU four yard line and less than thirty seconds on
the clock, big Tyrone Keys (a fellow graduate of Callaway High School) hit the
Bama quarterback and jarred the ball loose. When State’s Billy Jackson
recovered the fumble, Alabama lost any hope of winning, and the Bulldogs’
biggest win in history was in the record books. For a seventeen year old
freshman in the SEC skybox, that should have been enough to impress, but what
happened next is actually what has stuck with me all these years.
Along with the rest of the sportswriters, I went down to the
dressing room for the post-game press conference with the winning coach. There
was Emory Bellard (right), sitting on a small table puffing his ubiquitous pipe and
mumbling something about the game. Frankly, I don’t recall what he said, but I
have a feeling it was in fluent “coachspeak.” As we moved into the Mississippi
State dressing room, in walks none other than Coach Paul “Bear” Bryant, who
addressed the Mississippi State players. You could have heard a pin drop. He said, as I recall, something like this:
“Boys, ya’ll played a great game out there today, and I’m proud of you.” I
doubt that’s exactly what he said, but that’s the way I remember it, and it’s a
moment I will never forget.
With the win, Alabama dropped in the polls and would not be
at the top of the national rankings again until 2008. Incredibly, it was the
first time that MSU had beaten Alabama since 1957. The Tide went on to beat LSU
and Auburn, but dropped another game to Notre Dame at Legion Field 7-0, while
Mississippi State crushed LSU the next week and then narrowly defeated my
beloved Ole Miss Rebels on a cold, wet, nasty Egg Bowl in Jackson before 62,500
fans. Both teams went to a bowl game. Alabama went to the Cotton Bowl, where
they defeated Baylor. MSU was invited to the Sun Bowl, but State was bested by
Nebraska 31-17 to close out what had been a banner year.
Tomorrow night, Mississippi State heads to Tuscaloosa to
play the top-ranked Alabama Crimson Tide. Can it happen again? Does history repeat
itself? We will all know the answer soon enough. If Mississippi State wins,
though, I have a strong suspicion that Nick Saban will not be visiting the
visitor’s dressing room for a congratulatory speech.
PHOTO AND IMAGE SOURCES:
(1) Scoreboard: http://allthingsmsu.files.wordpress.com
(2) Bryant: http://www.ebay.com
(3) Bond: http://www.mmbolding.com/bowls/Hall_of_Fame_1981.htm
(4) Memorial Stadium: http://jsutigers.cstv.com/facilities/jast-facilities.html
(5) Game shot: http://www.youtube.com
(6) Bellard: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emory_Bellard
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