University of Alabama
By Carson McGurk
Mascot and Nickname
Mascot: Big AL.
Mascot and Naming
Nickname: Alabama Crimson Tide,
Mascot: Big AL the elephant. STORY: On October 8, 1930, sports writer Everett Strupper of the Atlanta Journal wrote a story of the Alabama-Mississippi game he had witnessed in Tuscaloosa four days earlier. Strupper wrote, that Alabama was a powerful, big, tough, fast, aggressive, well-schooled in fundamentals, and the best blocking team for this early in the season that I have ever seen. "At the end of the quarter, the earth started to tremble, there was a distant rumble that continued to grow. Some excited fan in the stands bellowed, 'Hold your horses, the elephants are coming,' and out stamped this Alabama varsity.
"It was the first time that I had seen it and the size of the entire eleven nearly knocked me cold, men that I had seen play last year looking like they had nearly doubled in size."
Strupper and other writers continued to refer to the Alabama linemen as "Red Elephants," the color referring to the crimson jerseys.
1900 Offensive formation in early newspaper accounts of Alabama football, the team was simply listed as the "varsity" or the "Crimson White" after the school colors.
The first nickname to become popular and used by headline writers was the "Thin Red Line." The nickname was used until 1906.
The name "Crimson Tide" is supposed to have first been used by Hugh Roberts, former sports editor of the Birmingham Age-Herald. He used "Crimson Tide" in describing an Alabama-Auburn game played in Birmingham in 1907, the last football contest between the two schools until 1948 when the series was resumed.
The game was played in a sea of mud and Auburn was a heavy favorite to win.
But, evidently, the "Thin Red Line" played a great game in the red mud and held Auburn to a 6-6 tie, thus gaining the name "Crimson Tide." Zipp Newman, former sports editor of the Birmingham News, probably popularized the name more than any other writer.
Facts
15 National Championships for football
On June 7, 2012, Alabama became the first team in SEC history to win the WCWS Championship defeating Oklahoma in three games.
The women's golf team won their first national title in 2012 while the men finished as the national runner-up.
It has placed in the top five at the NCAA Championships 25 of the past 29 years and won national championships six times: in 1988, 1991, 1996, 2002, and most recently won back to back titles in 2011 and 2012.
Paul “Bear” Bryant coached at the University of Alabama for 25 years winning six national championships and thirteen conference championships.
What kind of image do you think the university is trying to create with the use of the colors, logo, slogan, and mascot? Write this in no more than two sentences. The university wants to convey itself as one of the best. Alabama has won 3 National Championships in the past 4 years so they want to be at the top.