TCU v Mississippi – Deju Vu

Straight Talk living in the past edition

Words can’t describe my Horned Frog pride in how the Texas Christian University football team performed this season. If it were not for their fourth quarter collapse against the Baylor Bears they would have had an undefeated season that should have put them in the NCAA playoffs.

Sidebar – former Paschal Panther and TCU alum, famed sportswriter and the yoda of Fort Worth’s soul, expressed some skepticism when he tweeted:

Dan Jenkins ‏‪@danjenkinsgd Dec 7

When my beloved Frogs beat OU and Texas in the same season, it's a great year. Playoff committee was always about TV ratings, nothing else.

(for more on Jenkins check out his bio or many of the great books he has penned. His latest book, his memoir, “His Ownself – A Semi-Memoir” may be his best.)

Not making the playoffs puts the #6 Frogs in the Chic-Fil-A-Bowl (non officially Peach Bowl) on December 31 playing #9 Ole Miss Rebels (officially University of Mississippi.)

This isn’t the first time the Frogs have met the Rebs in a bowl game. The last time was the 1956 Cotton Bowl game. The Cotton Bowl game then was played at the actual Cotton Bowl at the Texas State Fair grounds in Dallas. Interestingly the game was played not on New Years Day as the only “real” and “major” bowl games were played in the day but on January 2nd, which was a Monday. Presumably then because College Football, a frivolity, was not to be played on the “Lord’s Day.” College football as Jenkins suggest may not any longer be a frivolity.

That day was going to be a great day for me. I was a TCU fan and the Frogs were going to the Cotton Bowl. My hero TCU halfback, Jim Swink, had been named an All American and another Frog and Fort Worth legend Johnny Vaught was the Mississippi coach. Vaught who was Valedictorian at Fort Worth Polytechnic High School played his college ball at TCU and too was an All American. Because Vaught was “local” his career and Mississippi had many followers in Cowtown.

What made the TCU – Mississippi special for me is my Daddy and a friend’s Dad got tickets for the game (I think they were $5 each – and fairly hard to come by). So it was off to Big D for the game. The Rosenthals and the Hermans first made a stop at the regionally famous Southern Kitchen for lunch. They had a buffet with all the fried chicken and shrimp with what were called fixins (now sides) for maybe $3 per person.

It was a clear day and as memory serves (I was 9) cool and brisk. Today I would translate that to between 45 to 50 degrees for the 2pm game. 

One thing I clearly remember was the Mississippi band unfurling the large Confederate Stars and Bars on the field prior to the start of the game and playing Dixie. In sixty years that has changed. While the team is still named the Rebels, their mascot is no longer a Confederate Colonel but a bear named rebel.

It is not the point of this post, but worth noting, one of the flash points of the 1960s Civil Rights movement was the admission of James Meredith to the University of Mississippi in 1962 with the assistance of Attorney General Robert Kennedy, the Federal Courts and 500 U S Marshalls.

It did not turn out to be a winning day for TCU. They lost 14 – 13, but it was a great game. The Frogs led 13 to zip at the half but could not hold back Vaught and the Rebs. TCU’s big problem was Chuck Curtis, their All Southwest Conference QB, was injured on the kickoff and was out for the rest of the game. You would not ever see that today. Back then players played both ways (O & D) and special teams (we didn’t even know what those were). There were few player substitutions.

Duly noted - Curtis played for a time in the NFL as backup QB for the New York Giants behind Charley Connerly, under assistant coaches Tom Landry and Vince Lombardi. Interestingly Connery had played his college ball at Mississippi under Johnny Vaught. Vaught also coached another pretty successful NFL QB, Archie Manning, (who is the father of oh you already know that.)

In 1957 (actually played on New Years Day) TCU returned to the Cotton Bowl and beat Syracuse 28 -27 in another hard fought battle. Syracuse their premier halfback that year, some guy named Jim Brown.

We will see what fate has in store for TCU at the Peach Bowl but they have proven a lot this year. Their performance shows a quality program can be built with focus and good coaching at even a private school with only 10,000 students.

End bar – I have linked in this post quite a bit. If you are interested take a look. The information on TCU’s reemergence as a mini Goliath and the look at Jim Swink are worthwhile.