Alabama Crimson Tide Football: More Rose Bowl History?

The Parade of Roses is older than the football game that bears its name. In 1890, some 12 years before the first football game there, local citizens held a parade with horse drawn carriages adorned with local flowers to the grounds were contests were held such as foot races, tug or wars and even jousting.

The planners felt the day needed something a little more special and decided to have a January first football game to add to the pageantry of the parade.

That first game was in 1902 and few know it was originally called the “Tournament East-West Football Game." It was to match a top team from the East with a Western power.

That first game was so bad that it almost killed the whole idea of ever hosting another football game.

Michigan came to play Stanford and was beating them so severely that Stanford quit in the third quarter after being pummeled 49-0. For the next 15 years that New Year’s Day celebration featured ostrich races, chariot races or anything other than football.

But on January first 1916, not only did football come back to stay, but Western pride was healed when The State College of Washington beat Brown 14-0.

For Nine years this was an East-West contest. A committee was formed to invite on the best of the best.

Southern football was looked upon by the rest of the nation as “Hillbilly Ball” and far inferior to the great teams of the North and the powerhouses of the West. And as a result the South was always snubbed from the Rose Bowl, the “Biggest and Best."

But Southern sports writers keep up the heat, telling how Southern teams could take on the best the rest of the nation had to offer. Shameless writers did everything but call the Rose Bowl Committee cowards for their reluctance to schedule a Southern power.

Following the 1925 Rose Bowl, the committee sought out a Southern team that was good enough to match up with a ‘real’ national power and set their sights on Alabama.

The 1925 Alabama team was led by Coach Wallace Wade and was undefeated yet outside the South, few thought these country boys had a chance against a ‘real’ team like Washington.

The first half certainly cemented that belief as Washington jumped out to 12-0 lead and seemed to have the game under control, but a rousing halftime talk by Wade changed the mood and momentum of the game and the Tide came out and scored 20 unanswered points until Washington came back with six of their own.

That 20-19 win did little to change the skeptic’s minds and many felt it was just a lucky win, but in the South, it was the game that changed football forever. For the first time, not only was a Southern school invited, but they won, and they won the National Championship as well.

Alabama was invited back the following year to teach them a lesson and silence the critics from the South who claimed absolute vindication with the Alabama win the year before.

1926 saw a Stanford team that was hailed as possibly the best football team ever assembled and no one gave a chance to the boys from 'Bama.

In fact, though the game ended in a 7-7 tie game, Stanford dominated the entire game with 305 yards of offense to Alabama’s 98. But late in the game after trailing the entire contest Alabama’s Clarke Pearce blocked a punt that set up Jimmy Johnson’s burst up the middle. Then before Stanford lined up, Alabama did a quick lineup and snapped the ball for the extra point before the Cardinals could line up to attempt a block.

North, East and Western sportswriters said Alabama and never proved anything except that they could tie by trickery only. However the Tide ended the season as National Champions for the second straight season.

It took five years for Alabama to return after several just so-so seasons, but this team was once again 9-0 and touted as the best in the nation and the 1931 Rose Bowl Committee still wanted to prove that Western teams were far superior and invited the Tide to return and face a 9-0 Washington State.

The Rose Bowl had just been enlarged to become one of the largest stadiums in the country, seating 81,000 people and tickets sold out fast.

By now, Coach Wallace Wade was an old hand to settling down the boys, many of whom had never traveled more than a few hundred miles from their home. That day Jimmy “Hurry” Cain engineered one good drive after another and the Tide buried not only Washington State, but the belief that Southern football was inferior.

Alabama was crowned a National Champion for that season’s work and Wallace Wade handed the reigns over to Coach Frank Thomas.

Frank Thomas fielded a 9-1 team, an 8-2 team and a 7-1-1 team before going undefeated in the regular season and seemed to be a front runner for yet another National Championship, so the 1935 Rose Bowl Committee wasted no time in signing up Alabama yet again.

This time their opponent would be Stanford yet again and they came in heralded as the “Vow Boys”. They were called this because following a crushing loss the USC in 1933, this team took a vow never to lose to USC again and they didn’t. In fact, they went to three straight Rose Bowls.

It was said they also took a vow never to lose to a Southern school again, but that vow didn’t work out so well as Alabama wowed the crowd with “Dixie’s Air Circus”.

Dixie Howell dazzled the attendees in what was the first great passing performances ever seen in the Rose Bowl. Alabama won 29-13 and another National Championship that season.

The Great Depression was not just an economic hardship that gripped America in the 1930’s but also a statewide depression as Alabama finally lost a Rose Bowl in 1938.

That 1937 team finished the regular season undefeated and went to face a California team that was also undefeated with one tie. Alabama moved the ball well throughout the game, but four costly fumbles saw them lose 13-0.

California’s Vic Botari barreled his way through the Crimson Tide lines for two touchdowns and 137 yards of sure handed running.

After not going to the Rose Bowl in 1942 in favor of the Cotton Bowl, where Alabama won yet another National Championship, the 1945 squad accepted what was up to now, its final Rose Bowl Invitation to play USC which had won 9 of the last Rose Bowl appearances in a row.

Even though USC had lost two games before this year’s Rose Bowl, many still thought they were the true Rose Bowl Champion and the Alabama game would make it an even 10 wins in a row.

Alabama quarterback Harry Gilmer scoffed at such talk and ran for 113 yards himself right up the middle of the vaunted USC defense to prove it.

Alabama simply steam rolled USC in one of the worst losses ever suffered 34-14. Those 34 points Alabama scored were more than USC’s previous eight Rose Bowl opponents combined.

The loss was so humiliating for the Westerners, no Southern team was invited back until 2002 when the Rose Bowl was integrated into the BCS structure.

Could this be the year that Alabama returns to the storied site and reclaim its title as the Rose Bowl’s best? Only time will tell, but that is the goal of this group of coaches, this team of young men and the hope of the entire 'Bama Nation.