Pitt-West Virginia: An Ode to Pure Hate in College Football
PITTSBURGH -- The Pitt Panthers and West Virginia Mountaineers are perfect enemies for one another and the Backyard Brawl meets just about all the criteria of a great college football rivalry.
It is long standing - Pitt and West Virginia have met on the gridiron 104 time dating back to 1895.
It is (relatively) contested - Pitt leads the all-time series 61-40-3, but West Virginia has won 14 of the last 20 games.
It has proximity - the two campuses are an hour and 20 minutes' car ride apart.
It has contrasting personas - industrial, big city Panthers squaring off with the Mountaineers and their Country Roads.
But most importantly, this rivalry has a brand of hate that feels like it was tattooed in the mind of every Panther and Mountaineer when they were born. There is no love lost for our collective enemy from State College, but the Brawl is a completely different animal. There's no emotional hedging and no haggling over whether it is actually a rivalry or not. Pitt hates West Virginia, West Virginia hates Pitt and losing this game is not an option.
The build up to Thursday's game - every jab about attendance or national championships or academic prowess - serves as a welcome reminder of why hate is sometimes good and productive, especially when channeled through something as relatively meaningless as sports.
We, the college football spectator, have already won. The past summer has been dominated by dollar signs and cold-hard rationality. The prevalence of the bottom line has forced everyone to grapple with the harsh reality that these schools have been left on the periphery of realignment and imperialized college football.
This is not a "helmet game" in the way that Notre Dame-Ohio State or Alabama-Texas is, but for one night, the eyes of the world will fall upon a 76-mile stretch of highway in Appalachia. The collective power of this small, easily forgotten region will be concentrated on 8,400 square yards of grass in Pittsburgh's North Shore that is seething with tension 11 years in the making.
The Backyard Brawl will make a lot of people a lot of money but that is an accessory to the game. This edition of the Brawl is an apology for what we lost when the allure of greener pastures in Power 5 conferences broke up this annual bar fight posing as a football game.
Realignment is coming and it will change college football as we know it, for better or worse. But this four-game series is a response to the powers that be - a closing argument for regionality in college sports. On Thursday night, Pitt and West Virginia - the most obvious and bitter of enemies - will create something beautiful and worth preserving.
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