writing ©Mark H. Pillsbury
Introduction:
One of the biggest games of the year is coming up in college football this Saturday, between the University of Texas and the University of Oklahoma. In this storied series, the Longhorns have a record of 59-41-5 against the Sooners; however since 1945 the series is very close. The game is played in a sunken bowl in the middle of one of the largest fairgrounds in the country, on the second Saturday of the Texas State Fair. The Cotton Bowl is an icon of Dallas and the historic Fair Park complex.
Every year in Dallas Texas, as summer wanes and the State Fair gains momentum; there is a happy confluence of sound, smell, weather, excitement, and football. Over a hundred thousand revelers converge on the Cotton Bowl, which is surrounded by food vendors, Midway games, and the bright sunshine of a north Texas morning. The smell of diesel fumes, horse manure, and fried food wafts through the air, mingling with the sulfur residue from OU Ruf-Nek shotguns and UT Smokey's pre-game cannon shots. Attendees stand in massive lines for overpriced staples such as corny-dogs and cold domestic draft beer, often the best medicine for the preceding night’s alumni party. The Cotton Bowl seems like the Dallas version of a Roman Coliseum on this day; some faithfully make the pilgrimage every year.
Fair Park, circa 1960
Construction began on a stadium in Fair Park in 1930 on a site once occupied by a rickety wooden football stadium. Two Dallas-area high schools fought the first game in the new stadium in October 1930. Initially it held enough seats for 45,507 spectators, and in 1936, the name officially changed to the Cotton Bowl. This Mecca has grown and been renovated numerous times since its construction, setting a new record for attendance of 96,009 fans at the 2009 Oklahoma vs. Texas football game, known as the “Red River Shootout” or the “Red River Rivalry” if you agree to use the politically correct name. This rivalry sits at the top of the list of college football “mega-matchups,” always televised, sold-out, prognosticated, and reported by the media. The Cotton Bowl is almost equidistant from home fields in Austin TX or Norman OK, and before conference realignment, it amounted to a “bowl game” placed right in the middle of the regular season.
[In addition to the Red River Shootout, the Grambling State University Tigers and the Prairie View A&M University Panthers play each other at the Cotton Bowl in the “State Fair Classic,” the weekend before the Texas-OU rivalry game. Also a neutral site for both teams, the game is played at night and the atmosphere is completely different at Fair Park.]
The Ramp:
Walking down the Cotton Bowl ramp/tunnel as a player evokes strong memories; emotions and excitement which can’t adequately be described in words. This stage is for the best young football talent in the country squaring off in a stadium equally divided between the teams, right down the 50-yd. line. Before trash talk and thuggery between players in the tunnel occurred like a prearranged gang fight, the seats on the side surrounding the tunnel were always crimson and crème, a sea of Sooner fanatics. The Texas players got as much abuse from the Sooner faithful above them in the stands as they did from the opposing team.
The Texas fan base on the other side of the stadium always arrived at their seats a little later than the Sooner nation, their party style a bit more sophisticated, and showing up “fashionably late.” You can count on a few things from those Okies: they’d be there early, drunk, loud, and wearing crimson. Some players endure slashing tirades, hateful haranguing, and pitiful taunts from slightly above their journey down the tunnel. Wearing your head gear seemed reasonable because you never knew what would fly down out of the sky.
Locker room jitters are part of being a football player. An old warrior who played in the game said that Head Coach Darrell Royal told the men it was their time; to focus on what they worked on that week in Austin. He doesn’t remember the words exactly but when they were given the final OK by the TV Guy to leave the locker room and head down the short flight of steps to the top of the tunnel, he recalls vividly stepping out into a frenzied, surreal, confusing world of childish taunts and inverted "Hook ‘em" signs (among other finger signs) being hurled from the walkway above. The following eyewitness account comes from an old veteran’s war story, told in my own way:
“Stadium security personnel in cheap yellow windbreakers and dark-blue cops from the Dallas P.D. loiter along the tarp-covered gate behind us. I recognized two of the motorcycle cops who led the police escort through the streets of Dallas a couple of hours ago; an officer with a large helmet and aviator glasses smiles as he gives you a quick salute and a loyal "Hook ‘em Horns!" You return the salute and mouth a quick, "Thank you" to the cycle-jock standing by his police Harley.”
The players hold at the top of the ramp, one more interminable TV break before they swell down the opening and burst out on the field of green. There's no breeze ... it's hot.
Looking around the crazy world of the State Fair of Texas, strangely, above the chaos drifts the dull din of bus engines, motorcycles, and the screaming siren from a ride on the Midway accompanied by Billy Squire’s rockn’roll. Beyond the gate clicks candy wrapping machines in the Salt-Water Taffy booth. Across the walkway, someone steps out of a black limousine just outside the gate, quickly escorted by Texas DPS troopers through the gathering and hurried down the ramp. Must be the governor or a senator; or Willie Nelson.
The warriors can hardly see over the glare of the glistening white helmets shining in the harsh October sun. Almost obscured is the long orange “horns” in the middle and stretched numbers on the rear of the white hats. The weather hardly feels like fall on this weekend. In fact, it more likely resembles August, baking the players on the small concrete landing at the top of the tunnel.
The ticketless, orange-clad well-wishers behind the chain-link gate, trying to get a quick look or a fingershake from a player or coach are the only friendly voices you hear at this small enclave of the Cotton Bowl. This end of the stadium holds the Big Red one, Boomer Sooner; a clan boisterous and loud like sailors on shore-leave.
"Get after 'em, Darrell!"
"Go Horns!"
"Anybody got a ticket?!"
"Can I have your chinstrap?"
“Players are taught to focus, look toward the light at the bottom of the tunnel. As we moved slowly downhill, wedged so tightly together our feet barely touch the ribbed, dirty concrete, we slowly floated down the ramp suspended among fellow teammates, moving like a herd of cattle. In the shade of the tunnel, beneath the stomping, screaming Sooner fans in the south end of the stadium, the cauldron subsides slightly, but I had trouble catching my breath. I couldn’t help but steal a glance at the opponents as they also assemble to move down the ramp on the opposite side. Even during pre-game warm-ups, looks are exchanged with all the misguided former high school teammates who wandered across the Red River.”
“Suddenly, and this instant sears into my mind, I clearly recall the crimson helmets with the white interlocked "OU" really piss me off at this point, emotion surges in the back of my throat. I feel like I might lose the steak and scrambled eggs I ate four hours ago in the quiet banquet room at the Hilton Inn on Mockingbird. I might puke on my teammate's back!”
“Instead I begin to yell out an unintelligible guttural sound. I feel better and other Longhorns join in, the sound reverberates in my helmet – ringing in my ears. My dry mouth sticky, chest pounding; all of a sudden, the uniform squeezes too tight, I feel enormous, I would love some Gatorade® right now; a huge ground swell of noise begins to engulf us we move closer to the light. Louder and louder. So glad I have this helmet on, not because you think one of those sloppy, jeering Okie rednecks will lob a corn dog, but the head piece makes me feel secure and impervious. I manage to reach my hand up and snap the chin strap tightly as we move into the sunlight at the bottom of the ramp. The swirling breeze on the floor of the stadium finally gets to the back of my neck and cools me slightly.”
Selmon dives for Akins
The roar echoes and reverberates around the base of the tunnel coming to a crescendo as the TV engineer holds the screaming, snarling warriors. This is the ultimate college contest, War Between the States; one of the oldest, fiercest rivalries in the game. Almost one hundred thousand people are here to enjoy the gladiators in battle, but millions are watching on television, often focusing closely through a lens on the fearful eyes of the boys engaged in this contest. It makes for great television! Only a few college football players will ever make this journey into the arena for such a matchless game. This day is now part of the history of the Texas/OU civil war, reenacted every October.
“The tears welled up in my eyes, and my throat choked up as my heart pounded out the rhythm of fear. Did the young soldiers landing on the beaches in Normandy feel the same physical symptoms that I do?”
“The players started cursing at the TV Guy to let them go, but he mumbled something about a baseball playoff game running long, and just hold up a little bit longer! You should’ve heard the stuff the players hurled back at him about what he could do with the baseball, they were instructing him about physically impossible tasks.”
I wonder if he hears the taunts, “Traitor!” A fat, red-clad woman waves a crimson pom-pom in his face. If I could grab her straw-blonde hair and pull the skank down into this fracas, she would not last long. Her boyfriend yells, “Darrell, you ain’t sh#*!” Perturbed as we are at the delay, Coach Royal merely nods."
“Finally, the human dam breaks; TV Guy fends for himself. He might have been trampled; we don't really care by now. Smokey blows a huge cannon blast; its perfect smoke circle rises above the sweltering grass field. I imagine a football sailing right through the center of the white smoke circle emblazoned against the clear, blue Texas sky. The band blares "Texas Fight" at what seems like an impossibly fast tempo. Running out together for the last time here, my teammates are jumping all over each other at the other end of the field encircled by a sea of screaming orange-clad fans. My eyes swell with emotion, I am not alone feeling this way. The noise carries us into battle; the day culminates as we enter the Cotton Bowl, the game awaiting is an unknown. I will never feel such a release again; this is the best moment of the season, the highlight of my career at Texas. Hook ‘em Horns!”
©Mark H. Pillsbury
[Game note: since 1945, considered the post-war era, one or both of the two teams have been ranked among the top 25 teams in the nation coming into 61 out of 66 games; the series is very close with Texas holding a three-win lead, 33-30-3 since 1945. This year the game will be played Oct. 6th in Dallas at 11:00am CDT and the Sooners are favored.]
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