Column: Ole Miss-Memphis rivalry is one we should see every season
Some rivalries seem natural. Alabama must play Auburn. Florida has to have Florida State on its schedule each year. Georgia and Georgia Tech are separated by only about an hour and have to play. Same with South Carolina and Clemson, and Kentucky and Louisville.
But there is another close-proximity rivalry that flies under the radar – Ole Miss vs. Memphis. And that’s too bad.
This one is what a rivalry is about, especially after Saturday. An underdog wrecked a ranked team’s season in front of a sellout crowd when Memphis, a 10 1/2-point underdog, shocked the No. 13-ranked Rebels 37-24. It was the Tigers’ first win in the off-and-on series since 2004.
Vaught-Hemingway Stadium in Oxford and Memphis’ Liberty Bowl are only about an hour apart, maybe 45 minutes if you know the back roads.
The two schools share a media market and recruit many of the same players, so the old saying is true that familiarity breeds contempt. As recently as last year, things got chippy enough on the field that a Rebels kicker was ejected when the two teams got into it.
Although Ole Miss has dominated the rivalry (48-10-2), it’s still heated because occasionally Memphis pulls off an upset that’s really painful for the Rebels. These kids all know each other, and that makes it fun. Ole Miss has five players from the city of Memphis – including offensive stars Jaylen Walton and Ben Still – and nine others from Memphis suburbs.
Even Ole Miss coach Hugh Freeze coached at Briarcrest Christian High School in Memphis.
The Tigers keep a lot of talent at home, of course. They have 19 Memphis natives and another six slipped across the state line from their homes in north Mississippi to play at Memphis.
The two teams first met in 1921 and have played 61 times, the eighth-most common opponent for Ole Miss. The Rebels have played only Mississippi State (111 times), LSU (103), Vanderbilt (89), Tulane (71), Tennessee (65), Arkansas (62) and Alabama (62) more.
The Tigers have only played Southern Miss (62) more than Ole Miss (61).
The geographical makeup would make this rivalry a no-brainer, yet they are only scheduled to meet two more times (2016 and 2019) in the next decade and that’s a shame. This is the kind of rivalry college football needs. Instead, future Ole Miss schedules feature the likes of Wofford, South Alabama, Georgia Southern and Southeast Louisiana.
Memphis gets Georgia State, South Alabama, Missouri State and Bowling Green in future.
Several natural rivalry games have gone by the wayside. Mississippi State has played Southern Miss the past two years, but it was only after a long hiatus. Ole Miss hasn’t played the Golden Eagles since 1983. Florida went to Miami last year and the game was great. Those two need to get together more often.
And there should be more. North Carolina-South Carolina got the 2015 season off to a great start. Why not always open the year with that game? Georgia and Clemson have played classics in the past. So has Florida State and Auburn.
There are some potential rivalries that would be a boon to the sport. If Texas A&M-Texas cannot get together, what if the Aggies took on TCU? Arkansas could reignite its old Southwest Conference rivalries and take on Baylor or SMU.
Why does LSU not play Texas? It would be intersectional, but the two states border one another. Same with Kentucky and Indiana, bitter basketball rivals with fan bases that can’t stand each other.
Vanderbilt could keep an IQ-Bowl concept going by playing Duke, Northwestern or Tulane each year. Missouri could play a variety of its former Big 12 brothers, especially Kansas.
Those matchups beat seeing Ball State at Texas A&M, New Mexico State at Florida and Louisiana-Monroe at Georgia. Sure those games help the mid-major schools with their athletic budgets, but they cheapen the season.
Natural rivalries would be beneficial to the schools, the conferences, television ratings and to the fans.
After all, Ole Miss-Memphis was pretty good Saturday. Just ask the 60,000 who were there.