Sixty-six years later, Fran Tarkenton remembers every detail about his college football debut. It came at Memorial Stadium, as Texas’ stadium was called then. And it happened when Tarkenton put himself in the game.
Tarkenton was the backup quarterback to start the 1958 season. Georgia’s offense was awful, and it was unable to get a first down. Tarkenton watched in growing disgust.
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“I’d been harassing Wally Butts to, ‘Let me in, let me in, let me in.’ He never did,” Tarkenton said last week.
So he took the initiative. When Texas punted early in the fourth quarter, Tarkenton noticed Georgia’s starting quarterback sitting on the bench. Standing at the 50-yard line, right next to Butts, the sophomore didn’t wait.
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“I just ran on the field,” Tarkenton said. “My teammates were telling me: ‘What are you doing here?’”
Butts either didn’t have enough time to stop him or just didn’t bother. Asked what Butts said to him afterward, Tarkenton said: “Nothing! Nothing!” Either way, what ensued was what is still one of the longest drives in Georgia history: 21 plays, 95 yards, capped by Tarkenton hitting Jimmy Vickers for a 3-yard touchdown, then hitting Aaron Box for the first two-point conversion in program history. (It was a new rule that year.)
Texas answered with its own long drive — 72 yards on 17 plays — to win the game. But the legend of Tarkenton’s career had begun, and it would have seemed like a good time for two of the biggest programs in college football to launch a storied rivalry. But that proved to be the last time Georgia visited Austin.
Until this Saturday, which will only be the sixth time the two powers have played each other.
The rivalry, such as it is, has created moments: Bevo going after Uga. Darrell Royal’s first game as Texas’ coach. Georgia moving a home game to Georgia Tech’s stadium for financial reasons. Tom Landry playing his final game with the Longhorns. Georgia ruining Texas’ national title hopes.
Some quick history:
1949: Orange Bowl, Texas won 41-28
This should have been a mismatch: Georgia was ranked No. 8 and on an eight-game winning streak. Texas was unranked with three losses and only got the Orange Bowl bid because SMU, which won the Southwest Conference, went to the Cotton Bowl.
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The game began fortuitously enough for the Bulldogs, who got a 71-yard pick six from Al Bodine. But the Longhorns rallied and went ahead with a touchdown run by Landry, who finished with 117 yards. The future Dallas Cowboys coach turned pro after the game. Butts suffered the first of three losses to Texas.
1957: Atlanta, season opener, Texas won 26-7
This goes down in Texas history as the debut for Royal, who finished 6-4-1 and ranked No. 11 in his first season.
The game goes down in Georgia history as an example of how different times were: Georgia moved the game to Georgia Tech’s home field because attendance would be better.
At the time, Georgia and Georgia Tech struggled to fill their stadiums if they were playing on the same day, “particularly Georgia, which is located in a sparsely populated area,” Dan Magill, wrote in Georgia’s official athletic department newsletter.
“No Georgia supporter could regret moving the Georgia-Texas game from beautiful Sanford Stadium to Grant Field any more than your Georgia Bulldog editor,” Magill added. “But we must admit that it was financially necessary to do so.”
Georgia was in the doldrums of the Butts era and finished 3-7, and the opener set the tone. As did the next year’s opener.
1958: Austin, season opener, Texas won 13-8
After Tarkenton’s heroics, Texas quarterback Bobby Lackey answered with his long drive for the game winner. The Longhorns finished 7-3 in Royal’s second season, and he won two AP and three coaches poll national championships in his 20-year tenure.
As for Georgia, the Tarkenton era had begun, although not without another hiccup. Butts didn’t play Tarkenton the next week at Vanderbilt, leading Tarkenton and teammate Pat Dye to decide to transfer. They had cleaned out their dorm room but were talked out of it by an assistant coach. The next season, Tarkenton led Georgia to a 10-1 season and another trip to the Orange Bowl, where the Bulldogs beat Missouri. Another matchup with the Longhorns wouldn’t come for almost three decades.
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1984: Cotton Bowl, Georgia won 10-9
Georgia essentially took away a national championship from Texas, which entered the game unbeaten and No. 2 in the AP and coaches polls and likely would have moved up after No. 1 Nebraska was upset that night in the Orange Bowl. But Georgia quarterback John Lastinger ran in a 17-yard touchdown with 3:22 left, and Kevin Butler kicked the game-winning extra point, capping the kind of low-scoring win that Vince Dooley liked.
Texas outgained Georgia 278-215 but committed four turnovers, including a muffed punt return that set up Georgia’s game-winning drive: Texas receiver Craig Curry, the short man on the punt return, thought Georgia was going to fake it, but instead the punt was short, and he tried to field it.
“I have no excuses. I don’t know what happened to me,” a tearful Curry said. “I had no idea it would be short. I just don’t know why I did it.”
Georgia, which entered the game ranked No. 5, moved up a spot, finishing 10-1-1 in its first year without Herschel Walker, who was watching the game from the press box.
“We’re not as good a team without Herschel, but this is as fine a group as I’ve had in 20 years of coaching,” Dooley said.
2019: Sugar Bowl, Texas won 28-21
The most memorable thing happened before the game and didn’t even involve the players or coaches: Bevo went after Uga, turning what was supposed to be a happy photo op into a viral moment. (Read about it here.)
The incident portended the game as Georgia, dealing with several opt-outs and injuries, fell behind early and never recovered, losing 28-21.
2024: Saturday in Austin
Sixty-six years later, Georgia makes its return to Austin, this time with the teams in the same conference preparing for a much-hyped matchup with national championship ramifications.
Tarkenton, who was in Napa Valley last week, said he’ll watch from his home in Atlanta if he’s home by then. Like everyone else, he’s glad it’s happening.
“Texas has a great team and a great coach. We have the same,” Tarkenton said. “It’s what it’s supposed to be. Great teams like Texas and Georgia are supposed to play each other.”
(Illustration: Meech Robinson / The Athletic; photos: Hargrett Library / UGA)
