One of the many side effects of conference realignment and the advent of the College Football Playoff has been the decline of importance placed on traditional rivalries.
An obvious example of this is the pause currently underway of the “Greatest Intersectional Rivalry” in college sports, the long-standing game between the USC Trojans and Notre Dame Fighting Irish. Both schools had some clear reasons for declining to schedule each other in 2027, with SC now in the Big Ten Conference, and sure enough, the rivalry won’t be played until 2030 at the earliest.
But even within conferences, the supersized alignment and desire to align all teams around a nine-game schedule has created necessary changes. Even with one of the sport’s best rivalries in recent seasons: the Alabama Crimson Tide vs. the LSU Tigers.
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This weekend, the two teams meet in Baton Rouge, with tremendous College Football Playoff implications. Both teams enter at 6-2, and while it’s possible, if not likely, that a three-loss team gets serious consideration for a spot in the tournament, the losing side won’t feel great about their chances to recover.
It’s a huge game for this year’s postseason. And it’s also the last of 63 consecutive seasons where Alabama and LSU have faced off.
The Tide and Tigers will play again in 2028, but the current format of the SEC’s future schedules means they won’t play each other every year moving forward. LSU head coach Lane Kiffin isn’t a fan of that arrangement, blaming the influence of “money” in the sport for the change in tradition.
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“I think that’s just sad,” Kiffin said. “And I understand, so I’m not being critical. All the decisions, usually, I think all of them probably really come down to money, whether that’s the realignments, whether that’s the rivalries. So, I think it’s all sad in general in the big picture of things that money drives to make [changes to] such great traditions and rivalries.
“And there’s really good things that have changed in college football over the years, but there’s also a lot that I think myself and a lot of people wish that they were the way that they were, rivalries and conferences the same. And so unfortunately it’s where we are that really doesn’t seem like much is going to be protected when it comes to TV contracts and money and other people’s ideas.”
Kiffin’s right; money is the driving factor in all college football decisions these days, and many traditional aspects of the sport have, and will be, upended as administrators and officials look to find every last available dollar. Like some coaches who say, bolt a job after having some success for a bigger payday at another school. But it’s an unavoidable consequence of push to standardize scheduling as much as possible.
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Speaking of scheduling, while Kiffin was right to lament the changes to the rivalry, he was a bit, uh, forgetful, when talking about the time of day for this year’s Alabama-LSU game.
While the atmosphere for night games at LSU is legendary, this year’s contest will be played at … 2:30 p.m. local time. Not an unusual starting time for a college football game, but not the late-night advantage LSU fans and their head coach would be hoping for.
Kiffin had a message for Tigers fans, and some advice on how they could prepare for the earlier than normal start time. On Monday, he said in a news conference that the noise during the Bama-Tennessee game clearly affected their offense, which he believes could be duplicated at Death Valley.
“Tennessee supposedly set the noise record against Alabama, which you can see in that game effecting Alabama’s offense,” he said. “That was a 2:30 central kick.”
The noise, he continued, could help their players out. As for how to generate noise earlier in the day? He had an answer for that too: “start drinking earlier.”
“We want our players to play well,” Kiffin said. “We want out coaches to play well. If you are used to 6:30, four hours earlier, start your day earlier.
“Have breakfast earlier. Start drinking earlier, whatever is your routine, just move it up.
“Go to bed earlier Friday night.”
As if Tigers fans need any encouragement.
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Kiffin went on to complain further about the start time, saying that the Tigers-Tide matchup has always been at night.
“Especially in 16 years, this game has been at night here all the time,” he said. “I never even considered that it wouldn’t be at night. So, I guess that’s probably naive of me.”
Interestingly, while still with Ole Miss a few years ago, he had an opposite perspective when it comes to SEC scheduling, saying, “LSU gets to play at night again, I guess? Shocker. That’s two for two for them. I feel bad for our fans not having one night conference game.”
Well, well, well, how the turn tables.
Time of day might be a bit of an advantage, and in a game expected to be as evenly matched as this one, any advantage helps. But Kiffin’s first season rests on getting a big win in a tough rivalry game, which is why he’s started with the excuses already. That tradition will never change, no matter how much conferences change.