There’s been some online debate this week about which rivalry is the most intense and also the “psychosis” of Ohio State fans who prioritize beating Michigan over winning national championships (raising my hand).  Thought I would take a stab at why I think this rivalry is unique.

The author of a fantastic college football Substack I subscribe to (and highly recommend) posted an interesting rebuttal to a debate about whether G5 teams should get one auto-bid.  He says no, but for an interesting reason.

On his Substack he also often cites Colin Woodard’s “11 American Nations Map,” which outlines the various cultures that exist within the US (Canada and Mexico to a degree also) and uses that as a lens for understanding different college football fandoms.

His point regarding a G5 auto-bid in a P4 playoff is that college football is not about the aspiration to win a championship (or even a playoff game), it’s about tribal competition.  I saw this and it piqued my curiosity about how it applies to Ohio State-Michigan.  I think this tribal competition theory, along with Colin Woodard’s map, explains the differences between the rivalries of Auburn–Alabama and Ohio State–Michigan, and also why fans of OSU and UM tend to prioritize beating each other over national championships.

Of note, I share all of this as someone who has some experience in the Auburn–Alabama rivalry: I married into it, my wife is a Tiger and I live in the South.

Auburn and Alabama are intertwined within the same tribe.  They’re both within the “Deep South” of Woodard’s map, and they jointly identify as Alabamians and Southerners more broadly.  Their rivalry is more of a civil conflict within the same tribe. It’s within families and marriages, which I think actually softens the intensity, for the most part.  Although occasionally there is the Hatfield–McCoy dynamic, where someone will go to the extreme and shoot someone.

Whereas the Ohio State–Michigan rivalry is a battle between two different tribes, in different states with their own identities and (slight) cultural differences. The people don’t interact as much – “they’re over there, we’re over here” – with a sharp geopolitical line (never mind there was an actual skirmish over that line). Additionally, it doesn’t have secondary rivals watering down the intensity (Alabama has Tennessee and LSU, Auburn has Georgia).

Another layer of complexity was introduced when Ohio State lost to Michigan last year then went on to win the national championship.  The exact same thing happened in 2017 when Auburn soundly beat Alabama, then the Tide snuck into the playoff and won the national championship. There were no discussions of that championship being imperfect or flawed due to losing the Iron Bowl.  Auburn fans didn’t even make too much of it and Alabama fans didn’t seem to care at all. It was just a game they lost.  

I believe that for many Ohio State fans the Michigan game is a higher-order tribal contest than the playoff or the national championship. National dominance is downstream from vanquishing Michigan, which is why some Ohio State fans (myself included) reasonably feel some sense of imperfection with last year’s national championship.

I tend to think OSU–Michigan is a more intense, hatred-fueled rivalry than Auburn–Alabama, but at the very least it’s an apples and oranges comparison, they’re just different.  There are others like Missouri–Kansas, Pitt–West Virginia, Minnesota–Wisconsin, etc., that generally are not competing for national championships but are no less hate-fueled and, in my opinion, are even more essential for understanding college football.

All of this is why comments like those from Saban are completely oblivious to the core foundational nature of college football, and why those of us who prioritize rivalries over national championships are not crazy.  People with opinions like that think of college football like a college-NFL where everyone is striving singularly and solely for national championships, and that’s simply not what it is about.  For the first 125+ years of the sport national championships were mythical; the game was built and grew around regional tribal rivalries, which is what makes the sport so special broadly and rivalries so insanely heated, like Ohio State–Michigan.

Anyway, thanks for attending my Ted talk… College football, it’s all about tribal battles.  Beat Michigan!