Texas-Texas A&M
This is the first time the teams have met without Texas (5-6, 2-5) ranked in the Top 25 since 1998, when the Longhorns defeated the then-No. 6 Aggies 26-24 on a late field goal. The Aggies started the season sluggishly, but have won five straight, pushing them into the top 20 in the country. The Longhorns were unable to recover from theirs and need a win to avoid missing a bowl game for the first time since 1997 -- also the last time they had a losing season.
The football series between the two universities is the third longest running rivalry in all of college football. Since 1900, the last regular season football game is usually reserved for their matchup. Each school mentions the other in their fight song (Texas with "and it's goodbye to A&M" in Texas Fight and the Aggies singing about Texas for essentially the entire second verse of the Aggie War Hymn). In the past, mischief has preceded the annual game, such as "kidnapping" each other's mascots. The Longhorns lead the series 75-36-5.
Auburn-Alabama
The Iron Bowl is a common name for the college football game between the Auburn University Tigers and the University of Alabama Crimson Tide. Auburn and Alabama played their first football game in Lakeview Park in Birmingham, Alabama, on February 22, 1893. Disagreement between the schools began immediately as Alabama considered the game to be the final matchup of the 1892 season and Auburn recorded it as the first of 1893. The series was indeed suspended after the 1907 game when the schools could not come to agreement over the amount of expenses to be paid players, as well as from where officials for the game should be obtained.
In 1947 the Alabama House of Representatives passed a resolution encouraging the schools to "make possible the inauguration of a full athletic program between the two schools." Ralph B. Draughon, the president of Auburn (then named the Alabama Polytechnic Institute), and Alabama president John Gallalee decided during the winter and spring of 1948 to end the disagreement and renew the series. The games would be played in Birmingham because it had the largest stadium in the state, 44,000-seat Legion Field, and the tickets would be split evenly between the two schools. Alabama won the first game when the series renewed 55–0, the most lopsided victory of the series.
Auburn desired to make the Iron Bowl a "home-and-home" series, and the schools reached an agreement where Auburn could play their home games for the Iron Bowl in Auburn starting in 1989 (except for the 1991 game, which was played at Legion Field), and Alabama would have a "home" ticket allocation for games in Legion Field. Since 1893, the Crimson Tide and Tigers have played 74 times. Alabama leads the all-time series, with 40 wins to Auburn's 33, with one tie. The game has been played in four cities: Auburn, Birmingham, Montgomery, and Tuscaloosa. Alabama leads the series in Birmingham (34–18–1). Auburn leads the series in Tuscaloosa (6–1–0) and Auburn (7–3–0). The series is tied in Montgomery (2–2–0).
Kansas-Missouri
The intense rivalry between the two universities can be traced to the open violence involving anti-slavery and pro-slavery elements that took place in the Kansas Territory and the western frontier towns of Missouri throughout the 1850s. These incidents were attempts by Missouri (a slave state) to influence whether Kansas would enter the Union as a free or slave state. The term Bleeding Kansas is often used to refer to the pre-war conflict, culminating with the burning and looting of Osceola, Missouri in 1861 by James Lane's Kansas Jayhawkers, which was a contributing factor to the Lawrence Massacre reprisal two years later. The raid on Lawrence was led by William Quantrill, a Kansas citizen who had actually taught school in Lawrence prior to the Civil War. SI.com supervising producer Dan George summed up the rivalry by stating "It's more than the schools -- it's a state thing going back to before the Civil War, when William Quantrill's Confederate guerillas burned Lawrence and murdered nearly 200 people. Neither Missouri nor Kansas folks have forgotten it." Those on the Missouri side are quick to point out that the Jayhawkers were guilty of the same things - crossing into Missouri, leading brutal raids and burning towns, and that Quantrill was part of a group that almost burnt down Columbia due to it being a Union stronghold.
The 2007 football season brought the origins of the rivalry between the two states back into the spotlight. A t-shirt created by a Missouri alumnus gained national attention with its reference to Quantrill's Raid of 1863. The shirt depicted the burning of Lawrence in 1863 following the raid of William Quantrill and his Bushwhackers against the Jayhawkers of Kansas. The image of Lawrence burning was paired with the word “Scoreboard” and a Mizzou logo. On the back of the shirts, William Quantrill was quoted, saying "Our cause is just, our enemies many." Some Kansas fans interpreted these shirts as supporting slavery. KU supporters returned fire with a shirt depicting abolitionist John Brown with the words, “Kansas: Protecting America from Missouri since 1854.”
The Missouri-Kansas football series is the second-most-played rivalry in college football history. The teams first matched up in football on October 31, 1891. There have been 9 ties in the 118 games played. On November 24, 2007, the two teams entered the game both ranked in the top five in the nation: Kansas at #2 and Missouri at #3. On the heels of #1 LSU's loss the day before, Missouri won the game 36-28 at Arrowhead Stadium in Kansas City, with a near-record 80,537 people (the second-largest crowd in stadium history) in attendance and the largest TV audience to watch any 2007 regular season game, and therefore became #1 in both the Bowl Championship Series and Associated Press polls.
Although 55-54-9 for MU is the official series result, there is an ongoing discussion about whether the 1960 games should have been counted as a win for Kansas, making the series 55-54-9 in their favor. The Big 8 forfeited the win to Missouri due to Kansas' ineligible player, Bert Coan. The University of Kansas still considers the game a Kansas win, fueling the controversy. Due to the Kansas win on the field, several other publications have also referenced the series record more to the favor of Kansas.
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