ESPN personality Sam Acho, a Texas native who played for the Longhorns from 2007-2010, made waves at this week’s SEC Media Days with a bold claim about the SEC’s newest members.
During a conversation about the most heated rivalries in the conference, Acho confidently asserted that the Texas-OU Red River Rivalry will instantly become the SEC’s premier matchup. He made that claim at the expense of the Iron Bowl.
Sam Acho is trying to say on SEC Network that the Iron Bowl doesn't have national appeal.
What are we doing here.
— Connor O'Gara (@cjogara) July 18, 2024
“The difference between the Texas-OU game — the Red River Rivalry — and, I would argue, the Iron Bowl, is that one is an intra-state rivalry, inside one state. The other one expands past one state. A neutral site game matters,” Acho claimed. “In Dallas, Texas, it’s 197 miles from Austin and 190 miles from Norman. Right down the middle.”
Sam Acho's argument here is certainly an argument that one can make… https://t.co/L9SFJJnT9f pic.twitter.com/jF60GiQeLu
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) July 18, 2024
“And not only do both teams travel right down the middle, but the stadium is split right down the middle,” said Acho. “I played in that game for four years: at the 50-yard-line, all you see is crimson and cream going one way, and at the 50-yard-line going the other way, it’s all burnt orange and white. And so the stadium is this interesting dichotomy of passion of fear, of anger and joy.”
“Think about other games and other quote-unquote rivalries where they’ve been very much one-sided,” he continued. “[The Red River Rivalry] means something year-in and year-out. Go back a decade ago and yes, Auburn had a lot of success a decade ago, but Texas vs. Oklahoma — who’s number one? who’s number two? — that game always meant something.”
Former Auburn center and current SEC Network host Cole Cubelic pushed back against Acho’s claim, adamantly making the case for the Iron Bowl.
“I don’t give a damn what fried foods you have,” Cubelic said of the Red River Rivalry, referring to the state fair that takes place at the same time as the game. “I don’t care if you have a 68-foot tall paper mache cowboy. I don’t care because none of that has to do with football. What has to do with football is how much you can’t speak to your relatives for the next 365 days because you lost that game. And you skipped school on Monday because you lost that football game… That’s what makes a rivalry, not a fried Twinkie, not a fried Oreo, not a giant clown cowboy.”
“I had to go comfort ugly tears from my eight-year old daughter after the game and it is one of the best college football memories I have in my life because I saw my children fall in love with Auburn football,” Cubelic added. “I don’t care about the damn score of the game. That’s the meaning that it has to me.”
Charles Vaughan is a contributing writer for Yellowhammer News.
