The Junkyard Blawg has moved!
Along with the other ajc.com blogs, the Junkyard Blawg has moved over to WordPress, where the blogging and commenting experience promises to be better. Join us over at the new WordPress version of the Junkyard Blawg by clicking on the link below.
AJC > Sports > UGA > Blog > Archives > 2008 > May > 25
Sunday, May 25, 2008
Playing favorites
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
It was sort of a mixed week in the Bulldog Nation. The baseball team once again continued its strange tradition of falling on its face in the SEC Tournament after winning the regular season championship. Of course, they’re still going to be in the NCAA Tournament, though they didn’t do themselves any favors regarding seeding. On the other hand, UGA picked up an unexpected national championship as the men’s tennis team took the title for the second year in a row. Dan Magill’s legacy continues to shine in the hands of Manuel Diaz.
Oh, and it came out that one of the football players had been arrested on a suspected DUI and likely will miss a game. Not good, but with only two other arrests so far, Mark Richt’s Dawgs certainly are having a less troublesome off-season than had been the case in recent years. Fingers crossed that no more members of the team run afoul of the law this year, but college students being the way they are (and always have been), that may be bucking the odds.
Speaking of football, always on the minds of the Bulldog Nation (with only about 14 weeks left until the season gets under way), a friend posed a seemingly easy question to me the other day that, on reflection, wasn’t so easy. What, he asked, is your favorite Georgia football game ever?
No-brainer, I thought at first. The Sugar Bowl win over Notre Dame for the national championship.
But then I thought about it some more. Certainly it capped my favorite season of Georgia football. And was the most important win by the Bulldogs. But was it really my favorite game? Herschel played hurt for much of the game, and it certainly wasn’t our best offensive showing that season. Perhaps that’s not really my all-time FAVORITE game.
But if not that one, which game would be the favorite? My mind ran back over great days on the gridiron for the Dawgs dating back to the era of Fran Tarkenton, when I first really started following Georgia football at about age 6. The 1965 shocker over reigning national champion Alabama came to mind, of course. Any number of wins over the Gators, too, including Appleby-to-Washington, Buck to Lindsay in 1980, and toppling top-ranked Florida in 1985. Plus 21-0 over Bama in 1976, the loudest game I ever heard at Sanford Stadium before they enclosed the one side; 10-to-9 in Dallas; the hobnail boot in Knoxville; and, just this past fall, that crazy day with the team flooding the end zone in Jacksonville … all favorites.
But I think the biggest rivalry has to come into play in picking an all-time favorite game. And there have been SO MANY great wins over the Yellow Jackets, both the come-from-behind variety like 1997 at Grant Field, and the butt-kickings like that glorious 51-7 afternoon Between the Hedges in 2002.
Then it came to me. My all-time favorite Georgia football game. Thanksgiving night on national TV at Historic Grant Field in Atlanta, and Andy Johnson leading the Bulldogs down the field in the last minute and a half, completing four passes before Jimmy the Greek vaulted over for the score.
Yes, I think that 28-24 win is my favorite, not because it was the greatest game I ever saw, although certainly it was one of the most exciting. No, I think it’s probably my favorite because I went to school with Andy, played touch football with him in junior high, cheered him and the other Athens High Trojans on at old Death Valley, and went through UGA at the same time. And if I were to pick my all-time favorite Bulldog players, Andy would rank way up there.
Those are just some of the intangibles that go into picking your favorite game or favorite team in college football.
And that’s one of the reasons why it’s my favorite sport.
Services »
