October 28, 2011

A Jayhawk and a Tiger walk into a bar.

Is it possible one walks out without the other?

It’s looking like it might just be.

It’s difficult to envision closing the cover on the Border War, college football’s oldest rivalry with Civil War roots. Thus is the Tigers’ standstill with one paw out the Big 12 door, the other still in, hanging by a claw to a storybook rivalry that cannot conceivably die.

For the entire span of this conference realignment saga, the fans have held distinct interest in finding a conference where Kansas could tag along. But as Missouri inches closer to boarding a midnight train to the SEC East, a scenario in which Kansas is not only left off the trip but off the schedule begins to take form.

Missouri grasped hopes of retaining the rivalry in a non-conference fashion last Friday. MU athletics director Mike Alden said the school would like to host an annual football game in Kansas City against a “traditional regional rival,” likely Kansas.

So, if the rivalry dies, it seems it will be on Kansas’ accord. The Jayhawks also showed Friday they are fully willing to lay it in the ground.

“The KU-Missouri rivalry belongs in the Big 12 Conference,” KU Athletics Director Sheahon Zenger said Friday. “Should Missouri decide to leave the Big 12, we would wish them well.”

“So, that’s it?” the Tiger pleads. “I thought we had something?”

Cue the cheesy music about all good things coming to an end.

Missouri’s final standing in this crazy conference realignment warzone will depend on factors independent of the Border War. Roasted Jayhawk specials, “FKU” chants and memorable trips down the I-70 lane will likely have no say in where Missouri stores its athletic and academic fate.

Still, the thought of leaving behind the despised-yet-beloved Jayhawks goes nowhere. It nestles within the fan segments of our brains, triggering visions of still-frames, scoreboard shots and shirt designs that have marked the 119 football games and 265 basketball games since the rivalry began on a chilly day in October 1891.

While a rivalry game doesn’t hold the keys to an entire school’s future path, one of this degree of nostalgia does carry a heavy level of value. That value plays out not just in fans’ hearts but also in their wallets. The same goes for recruiting – both of players and of students.

Border War showdowns pack Arrowhead Stadium every November with fans from both schools. Turning this into a nonconference event would only further its relative impact on overall revenue for both schools. Kansas realizes this, but it’s as if the Jayhawks care more about wishing Missouri good riddance than protecting its age-old rivalry.

Rivalries may not call the shots in college athletics, but they do provide the shots that make the collegiate game unique to the sports landscape — so much so that random stories deliver unique names that eventually evolve into brand labels. The Game, The Red River Shootout, The Civil War, The Battle of Tobacco Road, The Backyard Brawl, The World’s Largest Outdoor Cocktail Party, The Egg Bowl, The Iron Bowl — if you follow college sports, you know precisely what I’m talking about.

College rivalries split families, divide offices and deliver meaning to state lines. They unify regions, teach geography and supply emotion to colors.

Rivalries don’t just enhance college athletics. They _are_ college athletics. They are the representation of all the passion, tradition and pageantry that makes college fanhood an emotional investment.

In rivalries, the hatred runs real deep.

For Kansas, perhaps too deep.

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