Alabama Crimson Tide football, 1970–1979
Encyclopedia
: 1970 – 1971 – 1972 – 1973 – 1974 – 1975 – 1976 – 1977 – 1978 – 1979


The 1970s were the most successful in the history of the Alabama football program. During the decade the teams won 3 national championships (1973, 1978, 1979) and dominated the SEC in an unprecedented manner, winning 8 titles in 10 years. The school posted back to back undefeated regular seasons in 1973 and 1974 and ended the decade in the midst of a school record 28 game winning streak. Alabama participated in a bowl every season during the decade, part of a school record 25 straight bowl appearances.

1970

Alabama started the 1970s much as it ended the 1960s, going 6–5–1 after going 6–5 the year before. Southern Cal traveled to Birmingham for the opener and pounded the Tide 42–21, racking up 484 yards rushing. Auburn and LSU beat Alabama again, and Tennessee beat the Tide for the fourth year in a row. In the Tennessee game, quarterback Scott Hunter threw five interceptions and the team threw eight, both all-time Alabama records.

1971

Two big changes came to Alabama football in 1971. The first were Wilbur Jackson
Wilbur Jackson
Wilbur Jackson is a former American football running back for the San Francisco 49ers of the National Football League. He was drafted in the first round of the 1974 NFL Draft out of University of Alabama by the 49ers. He played five seasons for San Francisco, and then three years with the...

 and John Mitchell. Jackson, signed in 1969 and a member of Alabama's freshman team in 1970 (freshman in those days were not eligible for the varsity), was the first ever black player given a football scholarship to Alabama. John Mitchell, who made the team as a junior in 1971, was the first to actually play, eight years after the Alabama student body was integrated
Stand in the Schoolhouse Door
The Stand in the Schoolhouse Door took place at Foster Auditorium at the University of Alabama on June 11, 1963. George Wallace, the Governor of Alabama, in a symbolic attempt to keep his inaugural promise of "segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever" and stop the desegregation of...

.

The second was the wishbone offense
Wishbone formation
The wishbone formation, also known simply as the ’bone, is an offensive formation in American football. The style of attack to which it gives rise is known as the wishbone offense...

. In the wishbone, a variant of the triple option
Triple Option
The triple option is an American football scheme used to offer multiple ways to progress the football forward in the field of play. The triple option is based on the option run, but uses three players who may run with the ball instead of the two that are used in the standard option run.The triple...

, the quarterback lines up with a fullback and two tailbacks behind him, and on any play may keep the ball, hand off to the fullback, or pitch to a tailback. Passing is deemphasized. In the summer of 1971 Bryant flew to Texas to learn the wishbone from Darrell Royal
Darrell Royal
Darrell K Royal is a former American football player and coach. He served as the head coach at Mississippi State University , the University of Washington , and the University of Texas at Austin , compiling a career college football record of 184–60–5...

, who won national championships in 1969 and 1970 after his offensive coordinator Emory Bellard
Emory Bellard
Emory Dilworth Bellard was a college football coach. He was head coach at Texas A&M University from 1972 to 1978 and at Mississippi State University from 1979 until 1985. Bellard died on February 10, 2011 after battling Lou Gehrig's disease since the fall of 2010.Bellard is a member of the Texas...

 invented the formation in 1968. Bryant came back to Alabama less than a month before the 1971 opener and announced that Bama was shifting to the wishbone. The change was a closely guarded secret, to the extent that the Tide switched back to practicing the passing game whenever a member of the media was present. Bama's switch to the wishbone came as a complete surprise for the opener against Southern Cal, which had humiliated the Tide one year before. Alabama won the game, 17–10, and started the greatest run of success in the history of the program. Over the next eleven seasons, 1971–1981, Alabama won nine SEC titles and three national championships, and lost only four Southeastern conference games.

Alabama tore through the 1971 season to finish 11–0, with the Southern Cal win and a 14–7 win over LSU as the only close games. The season finale matched up a 10–0 Tide with a 9–0 Auburn team, the first and only time that both teams have come into the Iron Bowl
Iron Bowl
The Iron Bowl is an American college football rivalry game played annually by the Alabama Crimson Tide football team of the University of Alabama and the Auburn Tigers football team of Auburn University. The series is considered one of the best and most hard-fought rivalries in all of sports...

 with perfect records. Alabama scored 17 points in the fourth quarter to break the game open and win 31–7. However, the perfect season was ruined when Alabama took a 38–6 beating from the national champion Nebraska Cornhuskers in the Orange Bowl.

1972

Alabama won its first ten games of 1972 in just as dominant a manner as it did in 1971. The Tide had only one close game, on Oct. 21 against Tennessee, when they scored two touchdowns in the fourth quarter to pull out a 17–10 victory.

Then came the season finale against Auburn. Auburn also had a very good team in 1972 (the Tigers had lost only once and were ranked ninth going into the game) but Alabama dominated play, allowing Auburn only seven first downs and 80 yards of total offense for the entire game. With about five minutes to go, leading 16–3, Alabama lined up to punt. Bill Newton broke through and blocked Greg Gantt's punt, and Auburn's David Langner gathered up the ball and ran it in for a touchdown. That made the score 16–10. Alabama could get only one first down on the ensuing possession, and with 90 seconds to go lined up to punt again. Again, Newton blocked the punt, and again, Langner scored the touchdown. Auburn won 17–16, and the game went down in infamy (from a Crimson Tide standpoint) as the "Punt Bama Punt
Punt Bama Punt
Punt Bama Punt is the nickname given to one of the most famous games of the college football rivalry between the Auburn Tigers and the Alabama Crimson Tide known as the Iron Bowl.The game was played on December 2, 1972 at Legion Field in Birmingham, Alabama...

" game. Auburn would not beat Alabama again for ten years. Bama followed that loss up with a loss to Texas in the Cotton Bowl Classic and finished the season 10–2.

1973

In 1973 Alabama football enjoyed one of its most dominating seasons of all time. The Tide went 11–0 in the regular season, never winning a game by fewer than 14 points and scoring 35 points or more in eight of 11 games. Against Georgia, the Tide trailed 14–13 in the fourth quarter before rallying to win 28–14. Tennessee and Alabama were tied 21–21 going into the fourth quarter before Bama scored three unanswered touchdowns in the final period to win. In the Iron Bowl, Alabama earned a measure of revenge for the Punt Bama Punt game by beating Auburn 35–0.

Alabama was voted national champion
NCAA Division I FBS National Football Championship
A college football national championship in the highest level of collegiate play in the United States, currently the National Collegiate Athletic Association Division I Football Bowl Subdivision , is a designation awarded annually by various third-party organizations to their selection of the best...

 by the UPI coaches poll on December 4, the Tide's fourth wire service national championship. Through the 1973 season
1973 college football season
The 1973 college football season was the first for the NCAA's current three-division structure. Effective with the 1973–74 academic year, schools formerly in the NCAA "University Division" were classified as Division I...

, UPI voted before the bowl games, and Alabama still had the Sugar Bowl
Sugar Bowl
The Sugar Bowl is an annual American college football bowl game played in the Mercedes-Benz Superdome in New Orleans, Louisiana. The Sugar Bowl has been played annually since January 1, 1935, and celebrated its 75th anniversary on January 2, 2009...

 to play against undefeated Notre Dame
Notre Dame Fighting Irish football
Notre Dame Fighting Irish football team is the football team of the University of Notre Dame. The team is currently coached by Brian Kelly.Notre Dame competes as an Independent at the NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision level, and is a founding member of the Bowl Championship Series coalition. It is an...

. The game turned out to be a classic. Notre Dame checked into the locker room at halftime up 14–10, the big play coming on a 93-yard kickoff return for a touchdown. Each team scored a touchdown in the third quarter, leaving the Irish up 21–17 going into the fourth. Alabama took a 23–21 lead on a fleaflicker
Flea flicker (American football)
A flea flicker is an unorthodox play in American football designed to fool the defensive team into thinking that a play is a run instead of a pass...

 touchdown pass from running back Mike Strock back to quarterback Richard Todd, but kicker Bill Davis missed the extra point, leaving Alabama up by two. Notre Dame drove the ball downfield and kicked a 19-yard field goal to go up 24–23 with 4:26 to go. Bama could not answer, but the punt left Notre Dame backed up to their own goal. With time ticking away and Notre Dame facing a third and eight, Alabama had a chance to get the ball back in excellent field position, but Irish QB Tom Clements threw a 35-yard pass to tight end Robin Hayes and Notre Dame held on to win the game and the AP national championship.

Another notable moment came on September 22. That day, coach Bryant made his first trip to Lexington since leaving the Kentucky Wildcats after the 1953 season. Alabama won 28–14.

Schedule

1974

1974 saw Alabama go through the regular season undefeated for the third time in four years. Strangely, Bama's closest game came against a Florida State team that entered their matchup with the Tide as losers of sixteen games in a row. The Seminoles scored a touchdown in the first quarter and in the fourth quarter still had a 7–3 lead, but a safety and a field goal allowed Alabama to escape with an 8–7 victory.

The FSU game, a 21–16 victory over Maryland in the season opener, and a 17–13 win over Auburn were the only close games the Tide played all season. The season finale was a rematch against Notre Dame, this time in the Orange Bowl. Notre Dame, ranked ninth going into the game, beat Alabama again, 13–11. For the third time in four years, Bama followed up their 11–0 regular season with a bowl game loss. The Orange Bowl defeat left Bryant and the Tide 0–7–1 in their last eight bowl games.

1975

For the first time since 1970, Alabama lost its season opener, falling 20–7 to Missouri in a game where the Tide had only 118 yards total offense. Bama bounced back from that loss and won every other game of the 1975 season by double digits. The Tide won its fifth straight SEC title (an all-time conference record) and ran its conference winning streak to 22 games. Alabama ended the campaign with its first bowl victory in nine seasons, beating Penn State 13–6.

1975 also saw the renaming of Alabama's on campus stadium, after the Alabama state legislature voted to amend the name to "Bryant-Denny Stadium" in honor of Coach Bryant.

1976

Alabama was not quite as dominant in 1976 as it had been the previous five years. The season-opening 10–7 loss to Mississippi was Alabama's first conference loss since the Punt Bama Punt
Punt Bama Punt
Punt Bama Punt is the nickname given to one of the most famous games of the college football rivalry between the Auburn Tigers and the Alabama Crimson Tide known as the Iron Bowl.The game was played on December 2, 1972 at Legion Field in Birmingham, Alabama...

 game in 1972. On October 2 the Georgia Bulldogs held Bama to 86 total yards; the 21–0 loss was the first time Alabama had been shut out since 1970. For the first time since that same 1970 season, Bama failed to win the SEC title. Highlights of the 1976 season included a 38–7 victory over Auburn and a Liberty Bowl win over UCLA.

1977

In 1977 Alabama returned to its former place atop the SEC standings, going 11–1 on the year. The only blemish was a 31–24 loss to Nebraska in which quarterback Jeff Rutledge
Jeff Rutledge
Jeffrey Ronald Rutledge is an American football coach and former professional quarterback. He is currently the head football coach at Pope John Paul II High School in Hendersonville, Tennessee.-Early years:...

 threw five interceptions. On October 8, Alabama beat Southern Cal 21–20, turning away a Trojan two-point conversion in the fourth quarter to seal the victory. Bama beat Tennessee for the seventh year in a row and Auburn for the fifth year in a row, and finished up with a 35–6 victory over Ohio State in the Sugar Bowl.

1978

The only blemish on Alabama's record in 1978 was a loss to Southern California. Bama turned the ball over six times in that game. The next week's 51–28 victory over Vanderbilt started what became an all-time school record 28-game winning streak.

The 1979 Sugar Bowl
1979 Sugar Bowl
The 1979 Sugar Bowl was the 45th edition of the Sugar Bowl, which was played on January 1, 1979 in New Orleans, Louisiana at the Louisiana Superdome. The matchup featured the #1–ranked, 11–0 Penn State Nittany Lions and the #2–ranked, 10–1 Alabama Crimson Tide...

 against Penn State would go down as a classic. Alabama scored in the second quarter, then Penn State answered in the third, then Alabama took a 14–7 lead on a touchdown set up by a 62-yard punt return. Penn State had a chance to tie in the fourth, but quarterback Chuck Fusina
Chuck Fusina
Charles Anthony Fusina is a former professional American football quarterback. He played in both the National Football League and United States Football League and was an All-American and Maxwell Award winner at Penn State University in 1978.-Professional football:At 6'1" 195-lb., Fusina was a...

 threw an interception into the Alabama end zone. Then Alabama had a chance to put the game away, but fumbled the football back to Penn State at the Nittany Lion 19-yard-line with four minutes to go. Penn State drove to a first and goal at the Alabama eight. On third and goal from the one, Fusina asked Bama linebacker Marty Lyons "What do you think we should do?", and Lyons answered "You'd better pass." On third down, Penn State was stopped inches short of the goal line. On fourth down, Penn State was stopped again, Barry Krauss meeting Mike Guman and throwing him back for no gain. Alabama held on for a 14–7 victory. The Crimson Tide split the national championship, winning the AP poll while Southern California won the UPI poll. It was Alabama's fifth wire service national championship.

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