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My first college football game was the Egg Bowl at Memorial Stadium in 1981. I was a newly minted five year old. My memories are pretty vivid. We sat in the west endzone up in the second level and were surrounded by Mississippi State Fans. I was with my father. State lost the game, but by the third quarter, I had learned how to chant, “Go to Hell, Ole Miss! Go to Hell!” People sitting near us thought it was cute and before the end of the game I had been given a maroon and white pom pom on a stick and had learned how to ring a cow bell.

In any sport other than football, it’s nowhere near the level of the greatest rivalry in college sports. But as far as football rivalries go, it’s pretty close. There are stereotypes/tropes deployed in the commenting sections of blogs and newspaper articles. Ole Miss people think all MSU fans define themselves only in comparison to them. That alone speaks volumes about what’s wrong with many of the University of Mississippi’s supporters. State’s fans are feckless rednecks. And of course State fans think Ole Miss is a hopelessly corrupt institution that’s more country club than institution of higher learning.

Frankly, I think most of the mythology surrounding Ole Miss is horseshit masquerading as tradition. And I think that Mississippi State is a school on the upswing.

All of this is to say that the Saturday after Thanksgiving I get to take my oldest son to Starkville for the game courtesy of my wife and brother and sister in-law.

Hopefully we don’t lose the game to a fear of mascots and end up at Little Dooey again.