Dawgs or Jackets: Who Do You Hate More?

For the first time since 1888, Thanksgiving falls on the first night of Hanukkah, and if those two holidays don’t evoke sufficient feelings of love and giving, then the ensuing Black Friday should.

At least some are pushing to make the annual shopping bonanza include a little more meaning beyond the spending with encouragement for retailers, shoppers and manufacturers alike to give back to their communities. 

Yet amidst all this peace and joy rests impending hate. Yes, of the clean, old-fashioned variety as it’s Georgia-Georgia Tech week. The Bulldogs make the 70-mile trek to Atlanta on Saturday for a 3:30 p.m. kick at Bobby Dodd Stadium.

Georgia has scored triumphs in 11 of the last dozen meetings, and 18 of the last 22 contests after a 42-10 win last year in Athens. They lead the overall series convincingly, but Yellow Jacket supporters will quickly tell you that their storied football program owns more national and conference championships.

And to be sure, there’s no love lost between these two schools dating back to the first football meeting in 1893 when Tech scored a 28-6 win in Athens. Bill Cromartie’s book, Clean Old-fashioned Hate: Georgia Vs. Georgia Tech, describes the winners being pelted with rocks and debris while fleeing back to their Atlanta-bound train:

“At one time early in the last half of the game, a stone was hurled at one of the Tech players, striking him a cruel blow in the head... At another time, one of the Athenians drew a knife and threatened one of the Techs' better players... The Techs were also poked and gouged with canes on plays toward the boundary lines.”

Over the course of the last 120 years, the disdain between the supporters of these two schools hasn’t ceased and has been expressed in a wide variety or ways. And it continued this week in a rather ugly fashion. After Georgia standout quarterback Aaron Murray torn his left ACL in Saturday night’s win over visiting Kentucky, some Tech fans turned to public forums to very unsportsmanlike celebrate the season-ending injury to key Bulldog player.

Some of the comments from Tech fans were rather venomous, but that’s not to say similarly posts and comments haven’t come from the Bulldogs' support camp over the years, too.

It may not always be friendly, but there’s no denying the old fashioned hate between the fans of these two schools. 

So, who do you hate more and why? And with Murray out of the game, can Tech snap its four-game losing skid to the Dawgs? Let us know!

And please, as the rivalry’s nickname suggests, let’s keep it clean.