The Last Saturday in September
By Tom Mattingly
Sept. 27, 1980 was a day Auburn fans would just as soon forget. It was— amazingly— nearly 45 years ago. How is that possible?
Tennessee fans, those who were there and those who listened carefully to John Ward and Bill Anderson on the Vol Network, still remember it well.
It was Tennessee’s second time to play in Auburn, after years of playing Auburn’s “home games” in Birmingham, at Legion Field.
The Vols had first played at Auburn in 1974, losing 21-0. The 1976 and 1978 games were back at Legion Field. Both were losses.
For Auburn, the 1980 contest was a “dedication game,” highlighting the addition of 11,000 seats, a new press box, and club-level seating to Jordan-Hare Stadium. At the time, Tiger publicists billed it as the largest stadium in the state of Alabama.
Auburn was 2-0, ranked No. 18 by AP coming in, with wins over TCU and Duke. The university honored its “Team of the Seventies,” but neither Terry Beasley nor Pat Sullivan were dressed out in orange and blue that day.
The final score was Tennessee 42, Auburn 0, in a performance head coach John Majors termed “absolutely flawless.” It was hard to tell which fan base was more shocked by the size of the final margin.
A record crowd of 75,942 was in attendance, but the stadium cleared out rapidly in the third and fourth quarters, except on the Tennessee side. It was the Vols’ most dominant win over the Tigers in series history, eclipsing 28-point wins in 1956 (35-7) and 1966 (28-0).
It was Auburn’s worst loss ever at home and the worst overall, dating to 1948 when Alabama laid a 55-0 haymaker on the Tigers.
Tennessee had lost its first two games of the 1980 season by the narrowest of margins, 16-15 to Georgia and 20-17 to Southern Cal, both games played at Neyland Stadium.
There had been a 35-23 win over Washington State the week before the trip to the Plains.
This game was the second of three consecutive wins for the Vols over the Tigers, between a 35-17 win in 1979 and a 10-7 win over Pat Dye’s first Auburn squad in 1981.
Tailback James Berry, known better these days as “Eric Berry’s father,” scored touchdowns on runs of 4, 3, and 3 yards. Quarterback Jeff Olszewski, who completed 11 consecutive passes at one critical juncture in the game, added another, and threw TD passes to tight ends Reggie Harper and Mike “Go” Cofer, each covering 11 yards. Tailback Terry Daniels rushed 21 times for 125 yards, part of 248 yards rushing for the Vols.
The Vols led 7-0 after one quarter and broke the game open with a 21-point second quarter, adding single tallies in the third and fourth quarters.
It was the first victory for the Vols in the state of Alabama since a 41-14 decision over Alabama at Legion Field in October 1969.
The Vols had endured a barrage of oranges as they came onto the field for the game, not the first time that had happened, nor the last, but the unfriendly welcome seemed to galvanize the team.
George Cafego, the legendary Vol assistant coach, put the day’s events into proper perspective. After the game, he was seen snacking on an orange, maybe one that had been thrown at him earlier.
“These people down here don’t know you can eat these things,” George said. “They think the only thing you can do with ‘em is throw ‘em.”
Since Tennessee ended up 5-6 in 1980, many Tennessee historians, have chosen to focus on other big games taking place in winning seasons. This game is significant, however, being the first big road win of the Majors Era, deserving of more consideration than it’s been given.
The events surrounding the 1980 season marked a time of change for the Auburn football program.
Former head coach Ralph “Shug” Jordan had died on July 17.
Head coach Doug Barfield resigned after a loss to Alabama, with Pat Dye coming to the Plains and reestablishing the Auburn winning tradition.
The “Auburn Nation’s” reaction to the loss to the Vols infuriated David Housel, a true Auburn loyalist. “We at Auburn have always prided ourselves on being something special,” he wrote in the following week’s game program and reprinted in his 1991 book “from the desk of david housel… A COLLECTION OF AUBURN STORIES.”
“Alabama booed Richard Todd in 1975. Tennessee booed Jimmy Streater last year, and we booed Charles Thomas, one of our own, last week. The question is obvious. Are we really special anymore?”
The Vols and Auburn stopped playing every year after the 1991 season, ending the “Last Saturday in September” SEC hallmark game that each year separated the contenders from the pretenders.
The Vols would win at Auburn in 1998, a 17-9 victory in a national championship season highlighted by a memorable goal line stand that was a major key to the Vols’ victory.
A final thought. It still doesn’t seem right, even after all these years, for many Vol fans to wake up on the final Saturday in September and realize the Vols were scheduled to play someone other than Auburn, regardless of the venue.
