BLUE CHIP TAIL GATE

OXFORD-----A Princeton "Publication has listed the University of Mississippi as the number two party school in America. Anyone who attended the Missouri-Ole Miss game might disagree. The tail gate of all tail gates took place on this sultry September afternoon. Hundreds of tents were on display in the Grove. At my favorite tail gate party the Wild Bunch rode again.
Each and everyone of this celebrity group arrived separately. Their wives,of course,and some children accompanied the likes of Charlie Flowers, Squire Ed Wilburn Hooker, Dr. Shed Hill Roberson,Holcombe Hector, Kent Jr. Lovelace, and Warren (Beaux) Ball.
A special guest was Kent Jr.'s son-in-law Chef Emeril LaGasse, who viewed the football game in Chancellor Robert Khayat's private box. Emeril, as noted earlier in this space, will be the Grand Marshal of the 2008 Rose Bowl Parade which might not have excited Wolfgang Puck, the renowned Los Angeles Chef.
University of Missouri handed a whipping on the Johnny Rebs true enough but the Red and Blue did not fold, battling to the end. Missouri just might be one of the Best 25 teams in the country. In pre-season voting Ole Mizzou had been labeled the Big 12's top team in the Northern Division, ahead of the University of Nebraska.
Buck Howell, Bill Lee and I made the trip to Oxford. The campus was buzzing . Threatening rain did not materialize. Five O' Clock kickoffs are not bad. An added highlight of the weekend was the salute to Mitch Lavinghouze, who was attending his 401st straight Ole Miss football game covering a 35-year period. A Southern Mississippi grad, Mitch started going to Ole Miss games when his sons, Steve and Robin, were place-kickers for the Rebels.
In the press box Larry Liddell, Public Information Director of Tunica Mississippi, asked me when did I see Ole Miss play. I saw the 1946 LSU-Ole Miss game when Y.A. Tittle decisioned Charlie Conerly in a shoot-out. That was only 61 years ago. In 1947 I saw Conerly reverse the situation again in Baton Rouge and then saw Ole Miss come from behind to beat Johnny Vaught's alma mater, TCU, in the Delta Bowl at Crump Stadium in Memphis.
I saw my first games on campus in 1948 as the sports editor-columnist of The Mississippian. So next year it will be my 60th year of watching the Red and Blue play at Hemingway Stadium, now Vaught-Hemingway. The writers who covered the Rebels 60 years ago Walter Stewart, David Bloom, and George Bugbee are gone. So are the Mississippi writers Carl Walters, Wayne Thompson, Arnold Hederman, Dick Smith, Bill Ross, Charley Kerg and others. I am the last writer still standing who covered the Rebels back on those days except for Jack Hairston who left Mississippi for Florida many year ago.
Larry Liddell was Billy Gates' aide in athletic publicity and thinks the All-America Football Foundation should have another Banquet of Champions in Tunica in 2008. We certainly enjoyed earlier AAFF Dinners there.
It was good to see Mississippi State perform so well in New Orleans in trimming Tulane and all of a sudden the next opponent Auburn does not look as tough after all after bowing to South Florida in Auburn, 28-23 in overtime. Southern Miss played Tennessee on even terms until bowing in the second half, 39-19. And the Golden Eagles now must journey to Greenville, S.C. to play a vastly improved East Carolina State before a third straight road game against Boise State whose winning streak ended at the hands of the University of Washington.
The Notre Dame-Michigan game puts the loser in a terrible picture. Two unbeaten teams colliding is one thing but two 0-2 teams squaring off shocks everyone in college football circles. LSU routed Virginia Tech and is dueling Southern Cal for the number one spot at the moment.
College Football, Campus tail gateing with old pals. Shocking wins, shocking losses. That is what College Football is all about.
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