Hey ISU-Iowa: Real rivalries are more than a trophy

Let's be honest. As football rivalries go, Iowa State-Iowa is pretty weenie, to borrow the phrase of the old barfly commenting on the gang at 'Cheers' after they mistakenly thought Wade Boggs was their enemy and pantsed him.

I posted a snippet of that episode atop this post. It's on YouTube. It's part of one of the funniest half-hours in television history.

Anyhow, when you have a look the other school's famous oak trees as legendary Alabama fan Harvey Updyke Jr., did at Auburn, then you've got a rivalry. A sick one, perhaps, but a rivalry.

They call ISU-Iowa the Cy-Hawk Trophy Game, or some such drivel. Here are some names of in-state battles across America:

The Civil War:

Oregon-Oregon State

The War on I-4:

Central Florida-South Florida

The Holy War:

Utah-BYU

The Duel in the Desert:

Arizona-Arizona State

The Bedlam Game:

Oklahoma-Oklahoma State

Georgia-Georgia Tech was called 'Clean, Old-Fashioned Hate' by author Bill Cromartie, and the handle stuck.

Better to at least have a quirky name or a name with some tradition behind it. Alabama-Auburn is the Iron Bowl. You say 'Iron Bowl,' people know what you're talking about.

Mississippi-Mississippi State is the Egg Bowl. I don't know why, but I like it.

I swiped the following from Wikipedia, so it could be one complete fairy tale, but I like it:

In 1907, Ole Miss and Mississippi A&M (now Mississippi State) played a scoreless first half in extremely muddy conditions. Before the second half began, Ole Miss head coach Frank A. Mason brought out an urn filled with whisky-laced coffee in an attempt to warm his players. Sloppy second-half play resulted in a 15-0 A&M victory. After the game, many of the Ole Miss players blamed Mason for the loss. When asked if his team was returning home that night, Mason replied 'Yes, the team is going north at 11 o'clock. I'm going in another direction, and hope I never see them again!' It would be his final game as head coach.'

One time, just one time, could I please get to cover a story that good?

In Iowa, Luther and Wartburg colleges have a long, creative rivalry of over a half-century. Luther students stole the Wartburg Knight in 1959. To retaliate, Wartburg students painted Luther's statue of Martin Luther yellow.

Wartburg students burned a 'W' into Luther's football field, and it could be seen for three years afterward.

In 1997, two Wartburg students rented a light plane, flew it over Decorah, and dropped leaflets on the campus and the town. When they got back to Waverly, they were charged with littering. They were fined $90 and court costs. A small price for immortality.

Plus, their fellow Wartburg students had a collection and raised $140 for the culprits. That's tremendous.

I got that information from this page on Wartburg's website.

Iowa and Iowa State fans talk a lot of junk to each other, make their jokes, lob their insults. But there hasn't been a flyover with leaflets, or a rivalry name with 'War' in it.

The poisoned trees, we can do without.