What year did you start to follow college football?

[saturdaysarebetter]

What year did you start to follow college football?
1968 for me.

 

[tdaniels]

Well, I was taken to watch OJ and the Wild Bunch practice when I was little.  I then graduated from SC in 1985 and co-founded WeAreSC with GP back in the early ’90s.  I continued to cover SC games pre-game, post-game articles, player interviews, etc., from that time until -2015+/-.  So, hard to say.

[BigBalls]

Tdaniels, you’re the kind of guy we need on this site. How do we grow this place? Remove the Politics board? Advertise on YouTube!  targeting sites used by B1G schools? What  do you think?

• This reply was modified 1 week, 3 days ago by BigBalls.

[SC Gator]

1955

My first favorite Trojan was Jon Arnett. My gameday jersey is #26.

Attended my first two SC games in 1959; Baylor and UCLA.

Had public season tickets in 1963.

Attended SC from 1965-1972. The bear you see in my avatar was made in 1969, to replace the one that was made in 1967 and taken by the UCLA Kelps after the 1968 game. The picture was taken by a Daily Trojan photographer on the track after the 1972 SC-UCLA game.

[San Clemente]

dude, you are really old.  had no idea.   My first college and SC game was the 1973 Rose Bowl . I was just a kid.  Absolutely HOOKED after that game.   sc

 

 

[SC Gator]

Hard to beat the 73 Rose Bowl game as your introduction to college football.

I don’t feel bad about being old because just a few days ago Ballss wished me eternal life.

 

• This reply was modified 1 week, 3 days ago by SC Gator.

[SC Gator]

Wait till Butkus chimes in.

 

[Butkus51]

Bruddah SC Gator, AA, RB Jon Arnett is one of my all time favorite Trojan.  He was a big RB for his time 5-11, 195 lbs, an all purpose RB, very athletic did Track and Field (10 flat 100 yds, 25 ft LJ).  In HS did gymnastics too.

[Java]

Don’t remember how old I was but my dad used to get media guys from Purdue and there was a player named Otis Armstrong and for some reason that name just amuse me and cracked me up. my dad also talked about an astronaut named Armstrong from Purdue

and I don’t remember how old I was but not surprisingly. I mixed the two of them up and thought how cool it was that a football player from Purdue was walking on the moon hahaha.    those space helmets looked a little bit like football helmets back in the day  and television and new papers didn’t have the resolution they have now  so I guess my imagination took over the rest

I’m not sure how closely I followed Purdue but I would read the statistics in the media guide not long after that I began following their basketball program more statistics I guess that had to have been the early to mid 70s?  which means I was probably one or two years old. I was quite a prodigy Lol

[San Clemente]

no one cares. sc

[Java]

Said the only one to respond.

I’ve met many people with the glass half empty outlook on life. But you’re the first one I’ve met who’s misplaced the glass entirely.

 

[LA Duck]

1980

Didn’t care about college football until I was a freshman at Oregon, only NFL prior to that.

Fun fact:  My first-ever game at Autzen Stadium was the Oregon-USC 7-7 tie that year.  As good as USC was with Marcus and Ronnie and Bruce, etc., my quacks held their own for that one game during those dreadful years..

[SC Gator]

My first-ever trip to Oregon was the day before that 7-7 tie and the day after Mt. St. Helens erupted for the second time in 1980.   I had a same-day round trip flight to Portland.  I thought about staying overnight and driving to Eugene for the game but decided against it.  I listened to the game, though, and it was one of the least entertaining games I’ve ever heard.  If I had known you’d be there I might have driven down.

The worst was a scoreless tie with UW in 1961.  Second was a 7-7 tie with UCLA in 1971, which I attended as a student.  The only entertainment value that day came from the student section.  That was the day of the infamous “Westwood Sucks” card stunt.

 

• This reply was modified 1 week, 4 days ago by SC Gator.

[SC66]

1953 Rose Bowl

 

USC 7 Wisconsin 0

[San Clemente]

thought you were dead IQ66.   

• This reply was modified 1 week, 3 days ago by San Clemente.

[SC Gator]

Not the ’53 Rose Bowl.  Wisconsin wore white jerseys and red pants, and most of the players wore high-top shoes.

Maybe the 1960 game, Wisconsin v. Washington.

 

[San Clemente]

I use duck duck go.  and put in      1953 Rose Bowl Replay: Red-zone woes costly as Badgers blanked by Southern Cal
madison.com

 

I was still dead then. sc

 

[Java]

Second time you’ve used that website to make you look like a moron.

first times an accident second time is clearly you

 

If thoughts were food, you would’ve already starved

[San Clemente]

it’s not a website idiot.  it’s a search engine that provides privacy.  something you don’t respect.

 

got back to poisoning innocent illegal aliens in methland  with your micro-plastics.   sc

[Java]

Really? That’s what you got out of it. you went to the dollar store of search engines got wrong information twice

made yourself look like an idiot more than you already are twice

and what you got is that I use the word website instead of search engine?

Hard to believe that out of 100 million sperm you were the quickest

[SC66]

82 but still alive 

[Butkus51]

God darn it bless me, it was fall of 1880, when C. Walter Camp change the game from 20+ down to 11 man each side.  1869 to 1879 football was like rugby & soccer, each side having 20+ players on the field.  It was a kamikaze sport.  A lot of banging, rough stuff, with no helmet and padded gear.  You would score by kicking the round ball threw the goal post (like Australian football).

Those were da good ole days, lol…  Cheers

[SC Gator]

And here I thought you played high school ball with Flynn and Meadows.

 

[troystory]

Late comeback vs Oklahoma, in 82. I think. Right after the Marcus Allen era.

[ATLBRUIN]

1968.

[BigBalls]

Old Hick asked me to respond for him:

‘ Well now, mah pappy took me to see the  Tennessee Volunteers  play ovah at Old Johnson cornfield and dad gum it,  I’ll never forget it. It was November 21, 1881. Yup, sure was. We took Ole Betsy,  our mule out the barn,  and tied the wagon to it and off we go to watch some foosball. A few years later after a drought killed our crops, we hitched the wagon to Ole Betsy and came to the big city of Los Angeles. Well ah didn’t like it at first because there was lots of these illegals and their politics was communist. But mah pappy and mah and my cute cousin went to see the USC Trojans play their first game ever, November 18, 1888. It was 138 years ago but I remember it clearly, me and 278 guns are never wrong. Ah miss Ole Betsy. “

You’re welcome.

Let’s see if Gator can top that story. 1888 Gator, 1888.

• This reply was modified 1 week, 3 days ago by BigBalls.
• This reply was modified 1 week, 3 days ago by BigBalls.

[SC Gator]

Well, let’s see now.

First, we still haven’t heard about Ballss’ first exposure to college football.

Second, I call muleshit on the story about Ole Betsy taking the family to the Tennessee game in 1881.  It’s a good story, appropriately accented for local color, except for the little details — like, Tennessee didn’t start playing football until 1891.

But the story about seeing SC in 1888 can be validated.  I wasn’t there myself — despite what San Clemente says, I’m not THAT old.  But my great-grandfather was.  He used to tell me about it when I was very young and he was very old.  Great man, he was.  Oliver Wendell Holmes Gator was his name.  He remembers that was before there was cardinal and gold and before the team was called the Trojans.  It was SC’s first undefeated season.

Great-Grandpa Oliver raised his son to be a Trojan.  That was my grandfather, Thomas Edison Gator.  He, in turn, sent my father to SC in the 30s.  Dean Acheson Gator.  They all taught me right from wrong, how to tell a Trojan from a Bruin, and that you make the V with your palm out.

Hope this helps.

[SC Gator]

For Ballss.  Bumping to page 1.

 

[BigBalls]

Lol, ahh yes  Ole Betsy. I grew up near USC. 18th and San Pedro, St Turibius elementary. Sixth grade spelling bee champ by the way. Not trying to brag but the written word has always been my sword.  We had a field trip to USC when I was in the 6th grade. Since you know the area I won’t have to tell you how impressed I was with the campus. Imagine living in that neighborhood and then stepping onto campus? It was an oasis. I was a sports fanatic from the moment I gained the use of reason. USC football in the 70’s was about as good as it got. Rose Bowls, big games and USC always found a way to win the big games. The cardinal and gold. My first jersey was #28 home jersey. Damn I was proud of that jersey. High school was Wilmington Banning where football was king. Then on to USC where my dream of being a Trojan came true. I heard many people say, “well O  was deciding between UCLA,USC, Stanford, yadda yadda”.  Not me, it was USC all the way. I was a pretty good student and back then USC requirements weren’t too tough. I got in pretty easily. Ironically, I made it to only a couple of games the whole time I was a student because I worked weekends. But I have made up for it since then.

 

 

 

[BobLinMN-3]

’64 SC vs ND. My brother still has the tickets; $6 each.

[SC Gator]

Damn.  That one still burns, for two reasons.

First, I wanted to go to the game but my father had a large order to fill and the whole family spent all Saturday in his warehouse stamping and spraying eggs to send to Hawaii.  200 cases, or 72,000 eggs, hand-stamped 3 at a time and then sprayed with mineral oil.  At least we got to listen to the game on our radios.

Then, while we were out to dinner we found out the Pac-6 voted to send Oregon State to the Rose Bowl, even thoughthe conference had delayed the vote for a week to see if SC could beat Notre Dame.  I had to wait another two years before I ever made it to the Rose Bowl — ironically, after SC had lost to Notre Dame 51-0.

 

[BobLinMN-3]

Pac-6? When the Pacific Coast Conference disbanded, it was replaced by AAWU (Athletic Association of Western Universities), later to become the Pac-8. I believe USC was a part of the AAWU in ’64.

[SC Gator]

Yes, Pac-6.

Washington State joined the conference for the 1962 season and the Oregon schools in 1964.  But there was no full round-robin football schedule until 1970 and in ’64 I’m not sure if Oregon and Wazzu were even eligible to go to the Rose Bowl.  Oregon State was, obviously.  As a football conference, I thought of it as the Pac-6 until SC started playing Oregon and Wazzu, which was in ’67.

But to your point, the conference held itself out as the Pac-8 starting in ’64.

 

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