In the wake of Stefon Diggs’ stunning walkoff touchdown that enabled the Minnesota Vikings to beat the New Orleans Saints on Sunday, the question immediately arose from a friend of mine—is this the craziest ending to an NFL playoff game we’ve ever seen? GREAT 1980s SPORTS MOMENTS Start reading today. I went to the archives and […]
Alabama’s 26-23 overtime win over Georgia last night to win the College Football Playoff has been granted immediate status as an “instant classic.” Where does this game rank in the larger pantheon of the best college football national championship games. In this article, we’ll lay out the historical context and then try to place ‘Bama-Georgia […]
Life had good for the football fans of Iowa City over the past decade. Hayden Fry led the Iowa program to a breakthrough Rose Bowl trip in 1981. The Hawkeyes went there again in 1985, and then a third time in 1990. The 1991 Iowa football team didn’t quite make Pasadena, but they were still […]
The Colorado football program was on its greatest high coming into the 1991 season. They had played in the Orange Bowl for the national championship following both the 1989 and 1990 seasons. Each time they faced Lou Holtz’s Notre Dame and in the most recent matchup, had emerged with a victory. In the aftermath of […]
Alabama alum Gene Stallings returned to his school in 1990 as head coach, with a mandate to restore the glory days of Bear Bryant, whom Stallings had played for. The first season was iffy—even though the Crimson Tide got a Fiesta Bowl bid, they had lost four regular season games and then got crushed by […]
Penn State hadn’t seriously competed for the national championship since their dramatic title in 1986. Two years after that, Joe Paterno had suffered the first losing season of his illustrious career. A seven-win campaign in 1989 put the Nittany Lions back on the right track and then they went 9-2 in 1990, including an upset […]
The 1991 Florida Gators were a team and program looking for their first-ever SEC crown—at least one that would be officially recognized. They had won the league in 1984 and 1990, but each time probation was used as a reason to declare them ineligible for the official championship trophy. There was no probation in 1991 […]
Bobby Bowden had been knocking on the national championship door for several years at Florida State. He reached Orange Bowls following the 1979 and 1980 seasons. He came within one play of the title in 1987. He delivered contenders in 1988, 1989 and 1990. The most common theme of his inability to get over the […]
Gary Moeller had taken over the storied Michigan Wolverine football program in 1990 and while he enjoyed a good year, going 9-3, getting a share of the Big Ten title and finishing in the Top 10 nationally, he hadn’t done what Wolverine fans wanted the most—go to the Rose Bowl. The 1991 Michigan football team […]
The Minnesota Twins had won a World Series in 1987, but the ensuing years saw them fall badly off the pace. The Toronto Blue Jays were as consistent a contender as there was in baseball in the late 1980s and early 1990s. From these different starting points, the Twins and Blue Jays each won their […]
The 1991 Minnesota Twins were like a skilled presidential candidate that knew how to peak every four years and at the time where their advantage would be at its max. They won the World Series in 1987. They were overtaken by the powerful Oakland A’s for the next three years and slid to last place […]
For two straight years, the Atlanta Braves and Pittsburgh Pirates battled in the National League Championship Series. Over the 1991-92 stretch, both teams enjoyed the role of favorite and both teams enjoyed homefield advantage under the rotation system that at the time. These playoff battles had two other things in common—both times they went all […]
