How Florida football vs. LSU became the SEC's best crossover rivalry | Toppmeyer

When I consider how to describe the Florida-LSU football rivalry, I think about a shoe going airborne and contributing to a coach’s firing.

Part of Dan Mullen believes he’d still be Florida’s coach if not for Marco Wilson throwing a shoe into the foggy night sky during the fourth quarter of the 2020 installment of this series.

This became the most competitive, most consistently interesting SEC East-West rivalry, retained after the conference split into divisions in 1992.

The teams, which will play Saturday in Baton Rouge, didn’t start playing annually until 1971. Since then, Florida leads the series 26-24-2, courtesy of its 1990s dominance. Twelve of the past 20 matchups were decided by a single possession.

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This rivalry is among several likely to become interrupted after SEC expansion. The SEC will eliminate divisions next year in favor of a unified 16-team conference.

LSU will play Florida in The Swamp next season. The SEC’s schedule has not been determined for 2025 and beyond. However, long-term, this rivalry is not expected to be one that’s retained annually.

I’ll miss this series when that happens.

You never know what might happen when these teams meet. Did anyone have Wilson impersonating the “Austin Powers” character Random Task on their Bingo card?

Who throws a shoe, honestly?

Wilson’s penalty-inducing shoe toss contributed to Florida’s 37-34 loss. While not directly blaming Wilson for his firing, Mullen allowed himself to consider a world in which Wilson hadn’t tossed the shoe.

“I think we win that game, there’s a different mindset,” Mullen said during a preseason interview with Saturday Down South. “That domino caused a lot of different things to happen.”

Wacky stories like that shoe toss help form the backbone of the best rivalries. What this rivalry once lacked in history, it made up for in heated emotions and a competitive ledger.

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Although the campuses are separated by 590 miles, Florida and LSU fans often intermingle in the melting pot that is the Florida Panhandle, a popular vacation destination for LSU fans.

This rivalry always went deeper than the fans and coaches, though. Players sometimes view rivalries through a different lens. While most Florida fans consider Georgia or Florida State as rival No. 1, and LSU has as many rivals as any SEC team, the players in this series bring such a level of emotion that I never questioned its rivalry status.

Florida and LSU players just never seem to like each other much. Maybe, because of how competitive the game usually is.

“Florida has always been a game decided by one score, a rivalry game,” LSU’s second-year coach Brian Kelly said.

Nationally, this rivalry never claimed the prestige of other longstanding crossover matchups like Alabama-Tennessee or Auburn-Georgia.

Florida-LSU never felt shortchanged for theatrics, though.

The Third Saturday in October has its cigars.

Florida-LSU has the shoe toss, Hurricane Matthew, and Tim Tebow’s jump pass.

Lane Kiffin explains Ole Miss football's ‘house money’ approach

I’ve played enough blackjack to know what most gamblers do with house money: They bet recklessly, give it all back, and then some.

In the house money psychology, people often are riskier with profits than they are with their seed money. This mentality extends beyond the blackjack table and into investment strategy, too. But, money is money, and a smarter approach is to value the house money – or profits – you’ve acquired as if it’s your money. Because, it is.

So, my antennae shot up this week when Lane Kiffin repeatedly said No. 10 Ole Miss (8-1, 5-1 SEC) would take a “house money” mindset into its game against No. 1 Georgia (9-0, 6-0).

Was this code for onside kicks? Deep shots into double coverage? Reckless fourth-down attempts? (See Billy Napier’s failed fourth-down trick play he called inside Florida territory during the Gators’ loss to Georgia.)

I asked Kiffin to elaborate on what he meant by coaching and playing with “house money.” He didn’t point to a caution-into-the-wind approach. Rather, he hopes his Rebels will play loose, as the underdog, while Georgia faces the pressure of defending its 26-game winning streak amid a three-peat quest.

Kiffin says Ole Miss had that house money mentality when it played Alabama in 2020, Kiffin’s first season, when no one gave the Rebels much chance of upsetting Alabama.

TOPPMEYER: I'm nearly ready to change my mind on Ole Miss, Lane Kiffin. Just beat Georgia

Fast forward to September, and Ole Miss was viewed as having a shot at beating Alabama, in part because the Crimson Tide had struggled the two previous weeks.

The Rebels played a season-worst game in Tuscaloosa. They lost 24-10. Kiffin doesn’t want a sequel in Athens.

“I think (the house money mentality) allows you to play and coach looser, not uptight, not tense, not as stressed,” Kiffin explained.

I see the value in that.

Just don’t split your face cards. Playing with house money shouldn’t equate to recklessness.

Email of the week

Don writes: Interesting column, as usual. You are getting as much mileage out of Jimbo Fisher as (Knox News senior columnist) John Adams gets out of Jeremy Pruitt! Lane Kiffin has turned (Fisher) into an interesting person.

My response: Sports columnists are like sharks. We’re usually good at detecting blood in the water. Heck, sometimes we’re the ones chumming the waters.

Three and out

1. Opponents for the 2024 conference schedule already have been announced. Dates for SEC games haven’t been. Those dates will be revealed in early December, SEC Commissioner Greg Sankey told me and a few other reporters last week. Good. I’ve got hotel reservations to make.

2. Nick Saban is 1-0 this season in games he coaches with a bloodshot eye. Saban said his doctor thinks the 72-year-old coach busted a blood vessel while yelling at players before Alabama’s game against LSU. Saban said his assistants might need to take over some of the yelling for a while. Who’s taking the baton before Alabama’s game against Kentucky? Look for the coach with the red eyes.

3. Mississippi State’s Zach Arnett became the latest coach to ooze praise about Texas A&M’s talented roster and quality schemes. “They got talent all over the field,” Arnett said before his team’s game against the Aggies. Begs the question: How is Texas A&M just 5-4? Oh, Jimbo, how I’ll miss you, even if Aggies fans won’t.

Blake Toppmeyer is the USA TODAY Network's SEC Columnist. Email him at BToppmeyer@gannett.com and follow him on Twitter @btoppmeyer.

The "Topp Rope" is his twice-weekly SEC football column published throughout the USA TODAY Network. If you enjoy Blake’s coverage, consider a digital subscription that will allow you access to all of it. Also, check out his podcast, SEC Football Unfiltered, or access exclusive columns via the SEC Unfiltered newsletter.

This article originally appeared on Knoxville News Sentinel: How Florida football vs. LSU became the SEC's best crossover rivalry