Florida-Georgia in Jacksonville, another college tradition in trouble | KEN WILLIS
The bouncer is dialing up the “ugly lights” and the barmaid is signaling for last-call.
The World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party is winding down.
Normally, the DJ would tell us, “You ain’t gotta go home, but you can’t stay here,” but this time it appears “home” is the preferred option. At least among some grownups.
Over the decades, you’d hear occasional chatter about the Florida-Georgia game ditching Jacksonville for a routine home-and-home rotation among the Gators and Dawgs. Might’ve heard it more than once during Steve Spurrier’s dozen years of recalibrating the competitive balance of this rivalry.
Some of the UGA folks were in bad need of redemption after the ’95 game —one of two consecutive games played home-and-home while the old Gator Bowl was being rebuilt for the Jags. That’s when Spurrier’s Gators “hung half a hundred” on the Bulldogs in Athens — 52-17 — to become the first team to do that between the hedges.
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“We heard no one had ever done that before,” Spurrier famously crowed.
Spurrier, big on tradition, obviously enjoyed coaching against Georgia in Jacksonville as well. Rotating the game between Gainesville and Athens wasn’t something he ever pushed — he felt UF had built-in advantages in playing so close to home.
But the Steve Spurrier coaching era is seemingly light-years removed from today’s hyper-competitive world of blue-chip recruiting. The recruiting process is the mothership of every major football program with a campus attached.
Georgia coach Kirby Smart suggested going home-and-home with the rivalry because he doesn’t want to give up a game every other year — one in which he can host a couple dozen 4- and 5-star ballplayers and sell them on Athens and Sanford Stadium.
Kirby Smart carries Spurrier-level leverage, so you have UGA leadership looking to keep him happy while also keeping an eye on the budget.
The schools split over $3 million in ticket revenue and each receives $1.25 million from the city of Jacksonville, which also provides Georgia with $350,000 in travel expenses, compared to $60,000 in Greyhound fuel and boxed lunches for the nearby Gators.
All of that and no game-day staffers to pay, no stadium upkeep, prep and cleanup. All the revenue, none of the hassle. But also no recruits, and you might as well take away a modern coach’s oxygen.
Except for that mid-’90s blip, the game has been a Jacksonville affair — and college football tradition — since 1933. The current contract runs through next year, with the schools holding a two-year option after that. A joint statement from the two programs this week gives off bad vibes.
"The annual game between our two universities is an important tradition. At this time, both programs are focused on our current seasons.”
Well, you gotta start somewhere, you know.
“Typically both schools begin conversations regarding future games in the series as the last contracted game nears. We anticipate following that timeline.”
This isn’t the week for this conversation. We get it, so no headlines so far.
“When those discussions take place, we will consider a multitude of factors . . ."
Uh-oh.
". . . including tradition, finances, future SEC scheduling models with the addition of Texas and Oklahoma, and what is best for both schools' football programs overall.”
Ding-ding-ding. There you have it: Texas and Oklahoma. Adding those two blue-chip football corporations to the SEC will alter the conference’s scheduling format and that will become the scapegoat as Florida and Georgia decide they just can’t afford to give up a home game every two years.
Unless, in the end, they can’t afford to give up a bigger and better offer from the current host city.
Asked this week if the joint communique might be — at least in part — a bargaining tactic, Jacksonville Mayor Lenny Curry told the Jacksonville Times-Union, “There's a business side to everything. Money matters.”
Feeding the bottom line is a tradition that predates Florida, Georgia, Pop Warner and all the rest. Cash is still king and maybe it’ll save the party. But just in case, tip your servers on the way out.
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In the post-Spurrier years, Gator coaches are a combined 3-2 in their first matchup against Georgia. W’s for the Zooker, Urban and Jimmy Mac, L’s for Muschamp and Mullen.
Billy Napier faces an obvious uphill task in his first meeting, but there’s this: In his four years at Louisiana, his Ragin’ Cajuns were 4-0 against Louisiana-Monroe in the annual Battle on the Bayou.
What’s that mean? Not much, except maybe, just maybe, the Gators can beat that spread of 22½ — Dawgs by just 18.
• Elsewhere: Ohio State big over Penn State; FSU by 9 over Georgia Tech; Syracuse beats Notre Dame; Virginia over Miami; Oklahoma State beats Kansas State; Cincy over UCF; Tennessee big over Kentucky; Michigan bigger over Michigan State; Ole Miss by 12 over Jimbo; North Carolina in OT over Pitt; and at home in the Pennsylvania Borough of Dallas, the Cougars of Misericordia upset the Stevenson Mustangs.
BTW: Pennsylvania’s Dallas put its official stake in the ground 20-some years before the Texas version. There are fewer than 3,000 permanent residents, and apparently millions of leaves, judging from a rather direct memorandum just released by the township this week.
“Dallas Borough shares the leaf vacuum truck with three other municipalities and has limited usage of the truck. Our Road Department will bring the leaf vacuum to each street in the Borough ONE time during the collection program.”
What some of our neighbors would give for a giant vacuum right about now.
— Reach Ken Willis at ken.willis@news-jrnl.com
This article originally appeared on The Daytona Beach News-Journal: Gators and Dawgs in Jacksonville: Georgia's Kirby Smart not a big fan
