Season was one for history books

By Robert Blankenship The Leeds News

LEEDS — The road to the National Championship has been a long, dark one for University of Alabama fans. Since winning the title in 1992, the program has been placed on probation twice and there coaching carousel has been well documented.

There were a few bright spots here and there since that last championship season. Each of the Tide’s coaches seem to have at least one good season, including an SEC championship season under Mike Dubose in 1999 and Mike Shula led the team to a 10-2 record and a victory in the Cotton Bowl.

As a long-time Crimson Tide fan, obviously I was elated when the BCS National Championship trophy was handed to Nick Saban and the Tide players last week.

The post-game festivities at the end of the game was the culmination of an historic season for the Crimson Tide: an undefeated season, the school’s first Heisman Trophy winner, an SEC Championship and the national title. It has been a dream season come true for Alabama fans.

One of the greatest aspects of winning the national championship has to do with timing. Let’s face it, many teen-aged Bama fans have never seen the Tide bring a national title home. I was in college in 1992, and even at that age I had no true recollection of the titles won in 1978 and 1979. Now, there are many young Alabama fans that can say they witnessed an Alabama National Championship season.

Those people will include my 7-year-old son. This has been the first year he has really been involved in watching the games. His attention span wouldn’t always last the entire three hours of the game, but he would usually always come back before the game was over. He was very excited about the BCS game that he was asking ‘When does the game come on?,’ almost every day.

When the big night came he was ready. But, being the middle of the week, he wasn’t quite ready for late-night television viewing. Since the game slowed down in the third, he inevitably began to tire out. At about 10 p.m., he said he was going to get a pillow and blanket and lay on the floor. My wife and I looked at each other and grinned because we knew he wouldn’t last long there. I think he knew it too. Sure enough, after a few commercial breaks he was out like a light.

The following morning, he woke up realizing what had happened. We weren’t cruel, we woke him up and told him that Alabama won, but in the fog of half-sleep he must have forgotten. The poor guy walked up to us with watery eyes and shaky voice and said, “I missed the fourth quarter.” Luckily, due to the weather situation, school didn’t begin until 10 a.m. that morning, so Samuel got to watch the final quarter before going to school, proving once again that the DVR is the greatest invention of our time.

To Alabama fans, young and old, here’s a big Roll Tide to you! Let’s do it again in 2010.



– Robert Blankenship is the editor of The Leeds News. He may be contacted at editor@leedsnews.net

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