How to tell Tennessee and Alabama fans apart

Exactly which games to watch today, with the full TV and streaming schedule, plus links to all our team blogs, so you can make friends!

But it’s not actually the third Saturday of October. It’s Tennessee-Alabama day, so Spencer Hall put together a field guide of the 11 ways to tell Tennessee and Alabama fans apart. Here’s just one:

The Alabama fan generally thanks you for coming to Tuscaloosa. Don’t interpret this as a sign of hospitality. It’s passive-aggression of the highest degree, the churchiest f----you they can deliver after throttling your poor football team in four hours of sheer agony.

They’re the most spoiled fans in college football, and act like it. Doubt this for a second? Listen to a crowd at Bryant-Denny when even the smallest mistake is made. A state crisis occurs. A committee must be convened. Balls, mistakenly passed for some reason, must be run instead. The kicker. DAMMIT NICK, I LOVE YOU, BUT AT LEAST MIKE DUBOSE MADE DAMN SURE THEY HAD A KICKER.

Tennessee fans are more consistent. They start surly, rain or shine, and finish somewhere between bitter resignation (in defeat) or vehement, excited hollerin’ and random acts of gleeful violence. When the Volunteers beat Florida in 1998 in Knoxville, the goal posts wandered out of the stadium, into an O’Charley’s for a brief second, and then down the street until they were tossed into the Tennessee River.

If Alabama fans’ souls are salty ribs slow roasted over years of cool, never too-excited low-temperature excellence by a grumpy perfectionist, then Tennessee fans are a rusty but rumbling pressure cooker left unattended for years in a kitchen corner. The chefs long ago forgot what was in the pot originally. Several head chefs have come and gone and never bothered to tend it. It will blow up one day.

Quite a turnout. GameDay is coming to us live from James Madison this morning, and Dukes fans have been really, really excited about this from the second those orange buses rolled into town. This could be pretty fun.

In last night’s action. Memphis plastered Tulsa in the highest-scoring game of the season. Despite coming up well short on the scoreboard, Tulsa did manage to pull in a Hail Mary touchdown right before halftime. Bat the ball down, defensive backs of the world. Also, remember when Utah State shocked Boise State by 26 points? Yeah, San Diego State just beat Utah State by 34.

PAWL! Nick Saban was pretty complimentary of Texas A&M fans after Alabama’s game in College Station last weekend. He thinks Tide fans could learn a thing or two about getting loud.

19-9! Still looking for picks for today’s games? Let MASCOT FIGHTS be your guide, as they’re 19-9 against the spread so far this season. You can’t argue with those results, or with Rodger Sherman’s stance on spider mascots.

Oh no, the floorboards! QB Josh Rosen looked great for UCLA against Cal on Thursday night. After putting up some big numbers, he was able to retreat back to his dorm room for a soak in the hot tub. These are the types of ideas I know are horrible now, but I’m sure I would’ve signed off on without a second thought between ages 18 and 22.

Hand me downs. Baylor TE and noted large person LaQuan McGowan’s football pants make teammate Corey Coleman’s look like baby clothes.