The 1974 ABC experiment with active coaches as guest CFB analysts

In 1974, ABC made several key changes to its NCAA football coverage. The network elevated Keith Jackson to #1 play-by-play status and moved previous top announcer Chris Schenkel to the studio. This was also the season that ABC hired the college-aged Jim Lampley and Don Tollefson to serve as sideline reporters.

However, ABC did not regularly pair Jackson with lead analyst Bud Wilkinson. Instead, the network experimented by using a collection of active coaches whose teams were on an off-week to join Jackson in the booth and serve as guest commentators. And rather than adding a coach to the booth as a second analyst to supplement Wilkinson, ABC used the coaches as the only analyst on these games.

ABC did use Wilkinson with Jackson on some games that year. Bud worked other regional telecasts alongside Bill Flemming.

The list of guest analysts used by ABC in 1974 included the following then-active head coaches:

• Darrell Royal (Texas)
• Ara Parseghian (Notre Dame)
• Steve Sloan (Vanderbilt)
• Pepper Rodgers (Georgia Tech)
• Joe Paterno (Penn St)
• Paul "Bear" Bryant (Alabama)
• Woody Hayes (Ohio St)

along with Nebraska athletic director Bob Devaney who had recently retired from coaching the Cornhuskers. ABC used Oklahoma coach Barry Switzer as the analyst for the Sugar Bowl that season (as his Sooners were on probation and banned from bowl games).

ABC ditched the idea after one season. But early in the 1975 season, ABC did use Devaney as a guest analyst on one game and did the same with Parseghian (who retired from coaching after 1974) on another.

A few of the coaches on this list became TV analysts after retiring. Parseghian was hired full-time by ABC in 1976 and moved to CBS in 1982. He served as the lead analyst for a time on each network. Royal and Rodgers both worked some regional games for ABC in the early 1980s.

Here is the game that Joe Paterno called. With his thick Brooklyn accent and subdued voice level, Paterno was difficult to understand at times.



And here is a clip from the game with Woody Hayes in the booth. Hayes actually had some on-air experience as he conducted a local TV show which ran weekly during the football season for 28 years on Columbus station WBNS. But he didn't seem to add much insight as an analyst on this telecast.

Mets broadcaster Bob Murphy calling ABC college football in 1982

Bob Murphy is best known for his local TV and radio work for the New York Mets. Murphy was part of the original Mets broadcast crew starting in 1962 along with Lindsey Nelson and Ralph Kiner.

During the 1970s and early 1980s, Murphy also called some regional college football telecasts for ABC with a variety of analysts. Here is a 1982 matchup between Missouri and Nebraska with analyst Tom Gatewood joining Murphy in the booth.



I don't recall ever having the chance to see Murphy announce a football game as my area always seemed to get the primary ABC telecast on regional weeks. So it was a treat to stumble onto this video and hear that great voice once again.

Murphy did have some prior football broadcast experience as he was the radio play-by-play voice for the AFL New York Titans in 1962 and 1963 (the franchise was renamed to the Jets between those seasons). And on a few of those games from the west coast, his booth partner was Kiner.

The 1974 debut of the football sideline reporter role

This weekend marks the 40th anniversary of sideline reporters on football telecasts. On Saturday 9/7/1974, ABC introduced the college-aged duo of Don Tollefson and Jim Lampley in this role on the nationally televised UCLA at Tennessee game which started at 4 pm ET. Tollefson was beginning his senior year at Stanford while Lampley was a graduate student at North Carolina.

Here is the entire telecast:



Tollefson was the first of the two to appear on air with a pregame report at the 4:24 mark. Lampley provided a pregame feature at 10:05. Once the game started, Tollefson handled the UCLA sidelines with Lampley on the Tennessee side. ABC attempted to jazz up its telecasts by cutting to one of them periodically for brief reports and interviews.

The first in-game sideline report came at the 41:58 mark when play-by-play announcer Keith Jackson sent it down to Tollefson who interviewed a cheerleader. The moment comes off very awkwardly as Tollefson doesn't identify the interview subject in any way, but rather dives right in with a question. He would do the same thing when interviewing a police officer at 1:08:18.

In a 2009 interview, Lampley recalled this telecast, but completely botched the details of his on-air debut.

"I can tell you exactly the first time they threw to me during action. It was early in the game." The day before, he'd had a lengthy interview with Tennessee quarterback Condredge Holloway. Afterward, Holloway pulled Lampley aside and guaranteed that, the following day, he would throw for a touchdown on the Volunteers' first play from scrimmage. Says Lampley: "I'm like, 'Pardon me?' He said, 'Trust me. We spent all summer studying film. We know exactly how they bit. This is play-action to Stanley Morgan, and we'll score on the first play from scrimmage.'" On Saturday, Tennessee won the coin toss. Got the ball on the 20. Play-action to Stanley Morgan. Eighty yards. Touchdown.

"I had told the producer about it," Lampley says, "and he remembered, and amid all the hoopla, Keith [Jackson] threw to me on the sideline. I said, 'Keith, at our sitdown interview, Condredge told me he'd throw a touchdown pass on the first play of the game, etc., etc.' That was the first thing I did on camera. 

Tennessee actually scored on its second play from scrimmage (not first play) on a 74 yard TD pass (not 80). You can forgive Lampley for these relatively minor mistakes. But I found a major error with the rest of his description of his first sideline report - it never happened! As you can see from the video (the sequence starts at the 28:15 mark), Jackson does not send things down to Lampley after this play or upon return from the next commercial break. In fact, Lampley would not appear on camera during game action until the 47:43 mark when he provided an injury report with no mention at all of this scoring play.

Here is a sampling of some other sideline reports from this game:

• 49:37 - injury report (Tollefson)
• 53:55 - injury update (Lampley)
• 59:44 - mascot interview (Tollefson)
• 1:02:19 - injury update (Lampley)
• 1:10:54 - parent interview (Lampley)
• 1:15:19 - cheerleader interview (Tollefson)
• 1:27:22 - injury update (Lampley)
• 1:37:05 - halftime coach interview (Tollefson)
• 1:57:18 - halftime coach interview (Lampley)
• 2:22:06 - injury report (Lampley)
• 2:27:25 - parent interview (Tollefson)

I thought Tollefson appeared nervous on camera. I thought Lampley was more poised and sounded much better. Most of the interview questions from both men seemed quite lame. And many of the sideline reports seemed rushed.

A few other notable items from this video clip:

• Most commercial breaks were just 60 seconds.
• At 2:19:58, ABC promoted the upcoming Monday night telecast with an on-screen graphic which botched the spelling ("Darryl") of guest commentator Darrell Royal.
• You can hear a classic Jackson "FUMBLE!" call at the 2:23:10 mark.
• This footage also includes the Prudential College Scoreboard show with Dave Diles starting at 3:15:14.

Tollefson lasted just one season in the ABC sideline role and went on to have a lengthy career, primarily as a local sportscaster in Philadelphia. Lampley worked the sidelines for three seasons and then shifted into a play-by-play role on regional NCAA games in 1977. He made his mark mostly at the national level on ABC, and later on CBS, NBC, and HBO.

Ironically, in later years, both of the original sideline reporters encountered trouble with the law. In 2007, Lampley was arrested for a domestic violence incident and pled no-contest to a charge of violating a restraining order. In 2014, Tollefson was arrested for his involvement in a charity fraud scheme and spent time in jail.

This 1974 telecast was significant for other reasons. It was the first for Jackson as the lead voice on the ABC NCAA football package. He took over for Chris Schenkel who was moved to the studio. This was also the first example of a season-long experiment where ABC used a variety of current and former coaches as guest commentators in the booth. The analyst on this game was former Nebraska coach Bob Devaney.

The 50th anniversary of instant replay on 1963 Army-Navy game

On 12/7/1963, the CBS telecast of the Army-Navy football game featured the first use of instant replay on a live sporting event. CBS used a technique created by director Tony Verna to replay a touchdown run by Army QB Rollie Stichweh in the 4th quarter shortly after showing it live. The announcers on that game were Lindsey Nelson and Terry Brennan.

Some interesting aspects on the 50th anniversary of this great innovation:

• Nelson did not even learn about this innovation until the morning of the game.
• CBS had trouble getting the technology to work properly and only used one such replay during the entire telecast.
• The replay was shown at actual speed. Slow-motion instant replay would be developed in the future.
• CBS did not refer to it as "instant replay" on the telecast. That terminology would come later.

Here is a look back at this invention:



and more reflections from Verna on the historic first use.



The initial use of instant replay is also mentioned in the tremendous CBS Sports Network documentary on that game Marching On: 1963 Army-Navy Remembered which will be replayed several more times.

Verne Lundquist calling college football on ABC in 1978

Legendary broadcaster Verne Lundquist has been the lead CBS college football announcer since 2000. Verne got his network start calling regional telecasts on ABC back in the 1970s. His first game in the ABC booth was Ohio at Kent State on 9/21/1974.

Here is a collection of clips of Lundquist calling an ABC game in 1978 between Texas A&M and Arkansas - both members of the now defunct Southwest Conference. I find it quite interesting to hear how Verne sounded on the air some 35 years ago.



The analyst on this game from 11/18/1978 was former Air Force coach Ben Martin whose voice appears only briefly on this video.

BTN documentary on 1973 Ohio St-Michigan tie game

The Big Ten Network debuts a documentary on the 1973 Ohio State-Michigan football game at 7 pm ET on Saturday 11/16. Both teams entered that contest unbeaten, but the game ended in a 10-10 tie leaving the two teams tied for the league championship. The 60-minute documentary titled Tiebreaker also focuses on the controversial vote by Big 10 athletic directors to determine which school would represent the conference in the Rose Bowl. The documentary sounds awesome. The BTN also plans a few re-airings.

The BTN provided a preview clip of the film:



and here is a portion of the original ABC telecast of that game. ABC carried it nationally on 11/24/1973 with Chris Schenkel and Duffy Daugherty in the booth.

Daytime major network sports telecasts on weekdays

The typical timeslots for national sports telecasts on the major over-the-air networks are weekends, holidays, and prime time. It is relatively rare for TV networks to show daytime sports programming on weekdays when a sizable portion of the potential audience is at work or in school. But this does occur on occasion and here is a sport-by-sport historical summary of my research of such telecasts.

For the purposes of this post, I am only considering telecasts on the major networks (CBS, NBC, ABC, and Fox) and I am excluding major holidays.

MLB

From 1947-1970, all weekday World Series games were televised in the afternoon. NBC also aired two weekday afternoon games in 1971 sandwiched around the first prime time World Series telecast. The last weekday afternoon World Series telecast took place in 1972 when rain impacted the original weekday prime time schedule and NBC carried the rescheduled game 5 on a Friday afternoon.

Since 1969, most postseasons have featured at least one League Championship Series game on network TV on a weekday afternoon. The exceptions are:

• 1975 (regional weeknight coverage in prime time)
• 1994 (no postseason)
• 1995 (regional weeknight coverage in prime time via the ill-fated Baseball Network)
• 2002 and 2005 (both years, Fox would have televised a weekday afternoon game had one series not ended early) 
• 2007 (all Fox LCS telecasts were at night)

The 1981 divisional playoff round also included some weekday afternoon network telecasts. And, in 2001, Fox televised three League Division Series games on weekday afternoons.

Major networks also provided weekday afternoon coverage of the tie-breaker series in 1951, 1959 and 1962 and tie-breaker games in 1978 and 1980.

From 1949-1966, every MLB All-Star game was televised on a weekday afternoon. The same was true of the 1969 game which was rescheduled on a Wednesday afternoon following a rainout the previous night.

College basketball

From 1991 to the present, CBS has presented afternoon coverage of the opening Thursday and Friday of the NCAA Tournament.

On Friday Dec 31 in 2010, CBS televised an afternoon regular season game.

College football

Starting with 1973, the major networks have provided one or more afternoon telecasts annually on "Black Friday" - the day after Thanksgiving. Also, during the bowl season, networks have often televised weekday afternoon games on dates such as Dec 31 and Jan 2.

NFL

For many years, the NFL avoided playing any games on Christmas Day. When the holiday fell on a Sunday, this policy resulted in Monday afternoon Dec 26 telecasts of the NFL Championship game on NBC in both 1955 and 1960. In 1977, CBS televised a divisional playoff doubleheader on Monday Dec 26. CBS also aired a wild-card playoff game on Monday Dec 26 in both 1983 and 1988.

CBS televised an afternoon regular season game on Friday Dec 31 in 1993. Fox provided afternoon telecasts on Friday Dec 24 in both 1999 and 2004.

Golf

Going back to 1996, NBC has annually televised 2 hours in the late afternoon of the Thursday and Friday rounds of the US Open.

CBS provided Friday afternoon coverage of the Masters in 1956 and 1957.

Major networks added Monday afternoon coverage of 18-hole playoffs for:

• the Masters in 1962, 1966 and 1970
• the US Open in 1965, 1966, 1971, 1975, 1984, 1988, 1990, 1991, 1994, 2001, and 2008
• the PGA Championship in 1961 and 1967

and of Monday finishes due to rain for:

• the Masters in 1961, 1973 and 1983
• the US Open in 1983 and 2009
• the British Open in 1988
• the PGA Championship in 1976, 1986, and 2005

Tennis

For several years, CBS has televised Friday afternoon action during the second week of the US Open. Since 2008, CBS has also provided a late afternoon telecast of the men's finals on Monday. From 2008-2011, rain necessitated the Monday finish. Since 2012, the tournament has been scheduled to conclude on Monday.

Similarly, NBC has carried daytime weekday coverage for many years during the second week of the French Open tournament although much of that action has been on tape delay. NBC did the same for Wimbledon when it held the network TV rights.

NHL

NBC televised the 2012 Winter Classic on Monday afternoon Jan 2 as New Year's Day fell on a Sunday.

Auto racing

The 1997 Indianapolis 500 was postponed by rain on Sunday and suspended after 15 laps on Monday (Memorial Day). It was resumed on Tuesday May 27 and ABC provided a daytime telecast of the race.

Note: The 2012 Daytona 500 was postponed by rain on Sunday and Fox had planned to televised the rescheduled event on Monday Feb 27 at noon. However, additional rain caused the race to be pushed back to Monday night so the Fox telecast wound up in prime time.

Olympics


The major networks holding the rights have made a habit of devoting many daytime weekday hours to both the Summer and Winter Olympic games.

Summary

Several of these examples involve special circumstances such as rain postponements, tie-breakers, or events taking place on the day before/after a major holiday. The yearly staples which still wind up on "regular" daytime weekday TV are:

• NCAA Tournament opening Thursday and Friday afternoon sessions
• US Open golf Thursday and Friday rounds
• some action from the second week of tennis majors
• usually at least one game of the MLB LCS

History of #1 analyst demotions

<UPDATE 6/9/2016: Added the demotions of Harold Reynolds and Tom Verducci as co-#1 Fox MLB analysts.>

<UPDATE 9/16/2013: Added the demotion of Clark Kellogg as lead CBS college basketball analyst.>

CBS analyst Phil Simms received many unfavorable reviews for his recent Super Bowl 47 broadcast performance and some critics have even suggested that CBS might (or should) demote him from the lead NFL analyst position.

Simms has been the #1 NFL analyst at CBS for 15 seasons. He started there in 1998 working alongside Greg Gumbel and has been paired with Jim Nantz since 2004. For the three years prior to his CBS stint, he was one of two analysts on the #1 crew for NBC.

The post-Super Bowl speculation regarding CBS and Simms got me wondering about the historical frequency of such a move. So I decided to research cases where a TV network actually demoted its #1 analyst. Specifically, I looked at situations where CBS, NBC, ABC or Fox covered a sport using multiple announcer teams and I focused on the NFL, NBA, MLB, college basketball and college football.

For the purposes of this post, I am defining demotion as a case where the former "A" team analyst returns to the same network the following season on a lower tier broadcast crew.

Based on this research, no lead analyst with the longevity of Simms has ever been demoted to a lower tier crew on the same network. I only found 7 instances where a network demoted a #1 analyst who had been in that position for at least 5 years. In two of those cases, the "demoted" analyst actually moved into a play-by-play position. And in four of those cases, the network made the move to fit a newly hired broadcaster onto the "A" team.

Here is a closer look at those seven demotions ordered by longest tenure:

Tony Kubek (14 years as lead NBC MLB analyst)



Kubek had been the top analyst for the NBC baseball Game of the Week from 1969-1982 working first with Curt Gowdy and later with Joe Garagiola. In 1983, NBC hired Vin Scully as its lead play-by-play voice and Vin wanted no part of a three-man booth. So NBC decided to shift Garagiola into the lead analyst role alongside Scully and demoted Kubek to the "B" team where he worked with Bob Costas. Kubek remained in the #2 analyst role at NBC for 7 years. I believe this ranks as the most controversial lead analyst demotion of all time. On the plus side, Bob and Tony meshed so well together and I still consider them my favorite national baseball telecast tandem.

Bob Griese (12 years as lead ABC college football analyst)

ABC had used Griese as the top analyst for its NCAA games starting in 1987 where he worked with Keith Jackson. Griese remained in that role through the 1998 season. In 1999, ABC shuffled its broadcast crews and went without a true #1 team after Jackson switched to primarily covering west coast games. Griese remained on one of the crews which ABC treated as essentially co-#1. However, the network used Gary Danielson as the analyst for the BCS championship game that year.

Merlin Olsen (10 years as lead NBC NFL analyst)

Olsen had been in the #1 role at NBC from 1979-1988 working alongside Dick Enberg. In 1989, NBC brought in Bill Walsh as its new top analyst and demoted Olsen to the #2 slot. Merlin remained at NBC for only one season before taking an analyst position with CBS.

Bud Wilkinson (10 years as lead ABC college football analyst)

Wilkinson had served as the lead analyst on the ABC NCAA package from 1966 to 1975. He worked first with Chris Schenkel and later with Keith Jackson. In 1976, ABC demoted Wilkinson after it hired recently retired coach Ara Parseghian as lead analyst. Wilkinson remained with ABC for one season calling lower tier games.

Tom Brookshier (6.5 years as lead CBS NFL analyst)

Brookshier had been the lead CBS analyst since midway through the 1974 season when the network moved Pat Summerall into the top play-by-play role. That duo formed the #1 CBS team through the 1980 season. In 1981, CBS elevated John Madden into the lead analyst spot and shifted Brookshier to a play-by-play position on a lower tier crew. Brookshier remained with CBS for 6 more seasons after the demotion.

Don Drysdale (5 years as lead ABC MLB analyst)

Drysdale had been the top analyst on ABC Monday Night Baseball from 1978-1982. In 1983, ABC hired recently retired manager Earl Weaver as the new lead analyst. Drysdale stayed with ABC for 4 more seasons and became the play-by-play announcer on the "B" team.

Clark Kellogg (5 years as lead CBS college basketball analyst)

Kellogg was the #1 analyst on NCAA basketball for CBS 2008-09 through 2012-13. In September 2013, CBS promoted Greg Anthony to lead analyst. Kellogg became the lead studio analyst, but continued to serve as a game analyst on a lower tier crew.


Many cases involving a change to #1 analyst position featured an announcer retiring or moving to another network. Most of the long tenured lead analysts such as Billy Packer, Al McGuire, John Madden, and Tim McCarver were never demoted.

For completeness, here is a summary of the other cases when a network demoted its top analyst:

NFL

  Kyle Rote (3 years)

• #1 for NBC from 1968-1970
• demoted in 1971 for Al DeRogatis
• remained with NBC in #2 analyst role for 3 years

  John Brodie (1 year)

• #1 for NBC in 1977 
• partially demoted in 1978 when NBC essentially used co-#1 crews of Brodie (paired with Curt Gowdy) and Merlin Olsen (paired with Dick Enberg)  
• fully demoted in 1979 when NBC made Enberg and Olsen #1
• remained with NBC in analyst role through 1984

  Bob Trumpy (3 years)

• #1 for NBC from 1992-1994
• demoted in 1995 for the duo of Paul Maguire and Phil Simms
• remained with NBC in analyst role for 3 years

MLB

  Sandy Koufax (2 years)

• co-#1 for NBC from 1967-1968 (Koufax and Pee Wee Reese were on a 3-man "A" crew)
• demoted in 1969 for Tony Kubek
• remained with NBC as "B" team analyst for 4 years

  Bob Uecker (2 years)

• #1 for ABC from 1976-1977
• demoted in 1978 for Don Drysdale
• remained with ABC as "B" team analyst for 5 years

 Harold Reynolds and Tom Verducci (2 years)

• co-#1 for Fox from 2014-2015
• both demoted in 2016 for John Smoltz
• each remained with Fox in a lower-tier game analyst role

NBA

  Tom Heinsohn (4 years)

• #1 for CBS from 1983-84 to 1986-87
• demoted in 1987-88 season for Billy Cunningham
• remained with CBS in analyst role for 3 years

  Matt Guokas (4 years)

• #1 for NBC from 1993-94 to 1996-97
• demoted in 1997-98 season for Doug Collins and Isiah Thomas
• remained with NBC in analyst role for 4 years

  Hubie Brown (2 years)

• #1 for ABC from 2005-05 to 2005-06
• demoted in 2006-07 for Mark Jackson and Jeff Van Gundy
• has remained with ABC in #2 analyst role ever since

college football

  Ara Parseghian (1 year)

• #1 for ABC in 1976
• partially demoted in 1977 when ABC hired Frank Broyles - ABC essentially treated both Broyles and Parseghian as #1 analysts by alternating which of them was paired with Keith Jackson each telecast
• fully demoted in 1981 when ABC made Broyles the sole #1 analyst 
• remained with ABC as an analyst that year before moving to CBS in 1982

  Pat Haden (2 years)

• #1 for CBS from 1982-1984
• demoted in 1985 for Ara Parseghian
• remained with CBS as an analyst for 5 more years (and was reinstated as the #1 analyst in 1987)

ESPN 30 for 30 Bo Jackson documentary

The next edition of the fabulous ESPN 30 for 30 series chronicles the legendary Bo Jackson who achieved success in both MLB and the NFL. Jackson actually played both pro sports from 1987-1990 before a severe hip injury cut short his athletic career. His fame also exploded via the "Bo Knows" Nike advertising campaign.

The ESPN Films production is titled You Don't Know Bo and premieres Sat 12/8 at 9 pm ET with multiple replays scheduled. The ESPN site has a trailer for this film.

NBCSN documentary on Earl Campbell

The NBC Sports Network is presenting a documentary which profiles Hall of Fame running back Earl Campbell. After an outstanding career at the University of Texas, the "Tyler Rose" burst onto the NFL scene with the Houston Oilers in 1978. I still vividly recall his dominating performance in a Monday Night Football game that season against Miami.

The one-hour documentary titled Still Standing: The Earl Campbell Story premieres on Tue 12/4 at 11pm ET. Note that NBCSN  has a live college basketball game leading into this time slot, so plan accordingly if setting your DVR (or record one of the many scheduled re-airings).

The list of interview subjects includes longtime ESPN broadcaster Ron Franklin who was the radio play-by-play voice of the Oilers when Campbell played there.

The myth about the first prime time college football regular season telecast

Despite what many media reports would have you believe, a significant first in sports TV history took place on Saturday 11/16/1968. That evening, ABC televised the Alabama at Miami game at 8:30 pm ET with Chris Schenkel and Bud Wilkinson calling the action. This marked the first college football regular season prime time national telecast.

The following season, ABC provided national coverage of three prime time games in the regular season. The most famous of these was the Alabama-Mississippi matchup in Birmingham on Saturday 10/4/1969 at 9:30 pm ET with Schenkel and Wilkinson also at the microphones.

However, for some strange reason, numerous newspapers, books, and web sites over the years have incorrectly referred to that 1969 game as the first regular season prime time college football national telecast and multiple recent reports continue to make this mistake. Furthermore, it wasn't even the first such game in 1969 as ABC had televised Air Force at SMU in prime time at 9:30 pm ET on Saturday 9/13 to open the season. I am baffled as to why so many media outlets are wrong regarding the facts about a milestone telecast.

Here is a chronicle of some of these erroneous claims:

In 2007, ESPN compiled a list of the 100 defining moments in college football. ESPN ranked this 1969 game at #95 and described it as the "first nationally televised night game".

To commemorate its 50th anniversary in 2004, Sports Illustrated compiled a state-by-state "greatest of" feature. The section on Mississippi included the SI cover photo from the 1969 game and claimed it was "the first college game to be nationally televised in prime time".

In 2008, the University of Alabama official athletic site labelled the 1969 game as "the first prime-time telecast of a college football game". You would think the official Alabama site should know better since the Crimson Tide participated in the true first such game in 1968.

Thet same year, the Marietta (OH) Times and an LSU publication also printed the same error.

The same misinformation appears in several books. In 2005, ESPN published the ESPN College Football Encyclopedia. You would expect such a comprehensive reference work to be thoroughly researched, yet this tome refers to the 1969 contest as "the first regular-season college football game televised in prime time."

Other books making this false claim include:

• The University of Mississippi: A Sequicentennial History
• Football in the SEC: Southeastern Conference
• 100 Things Crimson Tide Fans Should Know & Do Before They Die

Fast forward to 2012 and publications are continuing to perpetuate this myth. In February of this year, the Courier Journal (of Florence, AL) called the 1969 game "the first national prime-time broadcast of a college football game". This summer, an Ole Miss site published a story describing the 1969 game as "the first national prime time broadcast of a college football game". And less than 2 months ago, an Alabama Crimson Tide online magazine contained a writeup on the 1969 game and stated that it was "nationally televised, a first in prime time for regular season college football".

So why do so many media reports continue to get this story wrong? Frankly, I have no idea, but I will offer a few theories:

• The 1969 game was much more exciting than the one in 1968 and probably resonated more strongly in the memories of those who watched it on TV. The 1969 contest featured several lead changes and offensive records with Alabama scoring late to win 33-32. Mississippi quarterback Archie Manning passed for 436 yards. Meanwhile Alabama won the 1968 contest by a score of 14-6.
• The 1969 telecast was in early October and featured two ranked teams, an undefeated Crimson Tide squad, and a highly publicized player in Manning. The 1968 telecast took place in mid-November when both teams had 3 losses and Miami was unranked.
• The 1969 telecast likely stood out more as it was the only game ABC televised that day. In 1968, ABC had regional coverage of other games in the afternoon and the national game from Miami that night.
• While I don't know how the myth got started, I suspect that once it appeared in print for the first time, subsequent publications picked up this erroneous information without verifying it and the effect snowballed. Still one would expect prominent media outlets such as ESPN and SI to perform more careful research. And there should be no excuse for media related to the Alabama Crimson Tide to make such a mistake.

In 2011, Ivan Maisel provided an interesting retrospective on the 1969 game on the ESPN site including a nugget that ABC chose 10/4 for its prime time telecast to avoid competing against the baseball playoff doubleheader on NBC that afternoon. Ironically, the central theme of Maisel's original article was the same false claim about the 1969 game being the first such prime time telecast. A reader pointed out this error in the comments section and Maisel updated the story to correctly cite the 1968 game as being first. Notice how awkwardly the second paragraph of that article reads from this revision.

Finally, I will point out that the weekly 2012 Miami Hurricanes football press release trumpets the fact that Miami was involved in the first prime time telecast in 1968, but incorrectly states that the game was played at Alabama. So even when the 1968 game gets its proper due, the truth still gets lost in the shuffle.

Darrell Royal documentary on Fox Sports Southwest

If you have access to Fox Sports Southwest (DirecTV 676), check out the special programming lineup planned for Thurs 11/22 which focuses on the football rivalry between Texas and Texas A&M. (Note: All times listed are CT.)

FSSW kicks things off with a look back at the 1963 game between these schools which featured a controversial finish and took place 6 days after the death of President John F. Kennedy. The schedule for that evening includes a re-airing of The Story of Darrell Royal, a 2003 documentary on the legendary Texas head coach with Keith Jackson of ABC among the interview subjects.

Keith Jackson and ABC conflicts with college FB and MLB playoffs (1976-1986)

Keith Jackson became the #1 college football announcer on ABC in 1974. Starting in 1976, ABC also held a share of the baseball TV package and used Jackson on its postseason MLB coverage. This resulted in some interesting scenarios on October Saturdays which featured both playoff baseball and college football on ABC. And there was no consistent pattern in the way ABC juggled these assignments. Here is a summary of how ABC and Jackson handled these conflicts year-by-year:

1976: ABC assigned Keith to the ALCS (along with Reggie Jackson and Howard Cosell) and that series opened on Sat 10/9. However, that day Keith instead called the Oklahoma-Texas football game while Bob Uecker substituted on play-by-play for game 1 of the ALCS in Kansas City. Keith called the remainder of the ALCS.

1977: Jackson was part of the ABC World Series crew with Tom Seaver and Cosell. On Sat 10/15, Jackson called World Series game 4. Earlier that afternoon, Chris Schenkel filled in for Keith on football and called the Texas-Arkansas game with Ara Parseghian.

1978: ABC and Jackson pulled an interesting stunt. ABC put Keith on the ALCS and he worked the first three games (with Jim Palmer and Cosell). Things got interesting on Sat 10/7. That day, Keith called Oklahoma-Texas (which started at 12:30 pm ET) with Frank Broyles. After the football game, he flew from Dallas to New York on a Lear jet that ABC had hired. ABC arranged for a police escort for Jackson from the Cotton Bowl to the Dallas airport and an ambulance to take him to Yankee Stadium (as ABC was unable to line up another police escort). Jackson arrived just in time to call ALCS game 4 (which started at 8 pm ET) that night.

1979: ABC used Jackson and Al Michaels as co-#1 announcers on the World Series (with Don Drysdale and Cosell), Jackson called games 1,2,6, and 7 in Baltimore while Michaels handled the middle three games over the weekend in Pittsburgh. This arrangement allowed Keith to call Oklahoma-Texas on Sat 10/13 with Broyles.

1980: Jackson again pulled a form of double-duty. ABC assigned Jackson to the NLCS with Drysdale and Cosell. On Sat 10/11, Jackson called Oklahoma-Texas with Broyles (which started at 12:30 pm ET). He then hopped a flight from Dallas to Houston and reached the Astrodome while NLCS game 4 (which started at 4 pm ET) was in progress. Drysdale called play-by-play for the first several innings. Keith joined the telecast about halfway through and called the action for the remainder of the game with Drysdale shifting back to an analyst role.

1981: ABC assigned Jackson to the AL East division series with Drysdale and Cosell. However, on Sat 10/10, Keith called Oklahoma-Texas with Broyles instead of game 4 of the MLB series. The duo of Drysdale and Cosell worked the baseball game with Don handling the play-by-play in Keith's absence. Jackson returned to New York for game 5 the next day. ABC also had the World Series this season and used the same arrangement as in 1979 with Jackson calling weekday games and Michaels handling the weekend. This allowed Keith to call Nebraska-Missouri on Sat 10/24.

1982: ABC put Keith on the ALCS with Palmer and Earl Weaver. This time baseball won the Sat 10/9 conflict as Jackson called ALCS game 4 in Milwaukee. Meanwhile, Curt Gowdy filled in to announce the California-Washington football game that afternoon with Broyles.

1983-1985: ABC did not use Jackson on baseball.

1986: Jackson worked the NLCS for ABC with Tim McCarver. On Sat 10/11, Keith called game 3 of the NLCS at Shea Stadium instead of college football. This was the last season that ABC used Keith on the MLB postseason. Jackson remained a fixture on the ABC college football scene through the 2005 season.

So, for the years that ABC used Jackson on both sports, we have a total of 9 Saturday conflicts (two in 1981). The final tally:

• Jackson skips a game of a baseball postseason series to call football - 2 times
• Jackson misses football to call baseball - 3 times
• Jackson calls both football and baseball on the same day - 2 times
• ABC removes a conflict via the Jackson/Michaels World Series rotation - 2 times

Jim Lampley calling Division 3 football on ABC in 1977

Here is an ABC regional college football telecast from 11/12/1977 between Division 3 rivals Wabash and DePauw with a young Jim Lampley calling the action. Lampley started with ABC in 1974 as a sideline reporter. By 1977, he had moved into a regional play-by-play role. The analyst was former Detroit Lions coach Rick Forzano.

At the time, the ABC TV contract with the NCAA required the network to televise a few Division 2 and Division 3 games each year, so this telecast helped ABC satisfy the terms of that deal. These D2/D3 games typically went to very small regional audiences. When this game ended, viewers joined in progress the primary ABC telecast between Colorado and Oklahoma which was called by Keith Jackson and Ara Parseghian.



Here is a brief video with some background on this telecast. ABC decided to televise it only 3 days in advance. This clip also includes a great tidbit about Billy Joel performing a concert on the DePauw campus the night before this game (which was 6 weeks after his breakout album "The Stranger" was released).

Error by filmmaker in ESPN 30 for 30 Pony Exce$$ documentary

One of the best episodes from the ESPN 30 for 30 documentary series was Pony Exce$$ which chronicled the 1980s SMU football program. An NCAA investigation into illegal payments to players led to the school receiving the so-called "death penalty".



Starting around the 28:55 mark, the film devotes a few minutes to the 10/25/1980 SMU game at Texas. This segment contains ABC TV footage featuring announcers Al Michaels and Lee Grosscup allegedly previewing this matchup between the Mustangs and Longhorns. The documentary inserts the 10/25/1980 date on the screen right after the first ABC clip and later describes this game as being on "national TV".

However, there are several problems here. ABC did not televise this 1980 game at all. ABC covered nine regional games in two timeslots that afternoon (noon and 3:30 pm ET), but not the game from Austin which started at 2 pm. The ABC video clip contains a CFA logo, but the CFA TV package didn't exist in 1980. Also, Michaels and Grosscup didn't work together in 1980.

It turns out that this ABC footage is actually from an SMU-Texas game in 1984. The insertion of this clip into the otherwise excellent documentary was a definite error by the filmmaker.