First Glance: Texas A&M at Alabama

What You Need To Know

• Tickets for this game are sold out. Best of luck on the secondary market.
• Alabama is 5-1 on the year (2-1 SEC). They narrowly escaped being upset last week in Fayetteville with a 14-13 victory over Arkansas.
• The Tide are ranked 7th in both the AP and USA Today polls.
• Texas A&M enters the game being ranked 21st in both polls.
• Alabama knocked off A&M 49-42 last season at Kyle Field.

Association of Former Students Events

Midnight Yell Practice

Friday, Oct. 17
Chuy's Birmingham
216 Summit Blvd.
Birmingham, Alabama 35243

All Aggie Tailgate

11:00 am, Saturday, Oct. 18
Hosted by The Association of Former Students and the Birmingham A&M Club in conjunction with Aggieland Outfitters. Will be held by the medical center, along shuttle route to stadium. At 4th Street and 5th Avenue, between the medical center and the Recreation Center Tennis Courts. FREE to all! Some food and beer will be available on a first-come, first-served basis (thank you to Slovacek's Sausage and Miller Coors brewing!), but please BYOB and some to share!
The Yell Leaders are scheduled to stop by for a pre-game yell practice around 12:00 p.m.
Check out http://www.aggienetwork.com/events/gameday.aspx for all of the details on these events.

Historical Notes

• Alabama leads the all time series with Texas A&M by a 4-2 margin.
• The first matchup between the Ags and Tide took place in 1942 at the Cotton Bowl. Bama won 29-21.
• Alabama was a charter member of the SEC, joining in 1932.
• The University of Alabama was founded in 1831, and currently has an enrollment of 34,852ish.
• According to Wikipedia, "the nickname Crimson Tide originates from a 1907 football game versus Auburn University in Birmingham where, after a hard-fought game in torrential rain in which Auburn had been heavily favored to win, Alabama forced a tie. Writing about the game, one sportswriter described the offensive line as a "Crimson Tide", in reference to their jerseys, stained red from the wet dirt."

Famous 'Bammers

• Bear Bryant
• Jackie Sherrill
• Robert Horry
• Joe Namath
• Bart Starr
• Rece Davis
• Winston Groom, author of "Forrest Gump"
• Mark Ingram

Media Blitz

Television

Game time: 2:30 pm CT
Channel: CBS

Radio

Texas A&M Sports Network
Texas A&M Spanish Network
Siruis/XM Radio

Post your thoughts and comments on the matchup below and check back tomorrow for THE TAILGATE.