Missouri Tigers and Kansas Jayhawks: A Return of the Border War

Kinda. Sorta. Maybe?

It wasn’t the epic 2007 Thanksgiving football match up between the Missouri Tigers and Kansas Jayhawks (Mizzou won 36-28).  It wasn’t the incredible 2008 Thanksgiving football matchup (Kansas won 40-37).

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It wasn’t as exciting as the 1997 double overtime thriller in Columbia (Mizzou won 96-94).  And it certainly wasn’t as remarkable as their final basketball clash in Lawrence that took place in 2012 (Kansas won 87-86).

No, Saturday’s epic clash at University Field in Columbia, MO, will never be considered the triumphant return of the “Border War” between KU and Mizzou.  But it was fun to see the two schools playing against one another again (Mizzou won 6-3).  Fun, but it just wasn’t quite the same.  There wasn’t the same “juice” behind the game.

It’s not every day that your Twitter feed includes multiple mentions of a women’s softball game.  But that’s exactly what happened once it was official that the Tigers and Jayhawks would be facing each other.  Twitter was abuzz with the return of the Border War…

Nothing against the millions of wonderful young women throughout the country that participate in women’s softball.  But the real reason most people were talking about the softball match up was because they miss the rivalry.  They miss it so badly they can taste it.

They miss the nastiness.  They miss the ritual.  They miss the banter.  KU fans miss taunting Mizzou fans about their discombobulated basketball program.  Mizzou fans miss taunting KU fans about their train wreck of a football program.

Mar 23, 2014; St. Louis, MO, USA; Kansas Jayhawks mascot performs during a time-out against the Stanford Cardinal during the second half in the third round of the 2014 NCAA Men

They miss the blowouts, they miss the nail-biters, they miss the build-up before each game and they miss the trash talk.  But most importantly, they miss the actual games.

It’s time to bring back the games.  The games are the only things that matter in the whole grand scheme of things.  I don’t care who has to swallow their pride and I don’t care who makes the first move.  But the fans and alumni deserve this.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with playing a basketball game at the Sprint Center and playing a football game at Arrowhead each year.  It’s been over two years now.  It’s time to resume the games.

I really couldn’t give a rip about whose “fault” this whole thing is.  KU fans blame it on Mizzou because they left for the SEC.  Mizzou fans blame it on KU for a myriad of reasons.

Go to any article on the worldwide inter-web that references the Border War and you’ll see tons of comments.  The majority of the comments boil down to one fan base blaming the other fan base for allowing the Border War to collapse.

Seriously, who cares?  It literally doesn’t matter who’s at fault.  Everyone needs to quit acting like a 4-year old kid who just got told ‘no’ for the first time.

It’s time to put these games back on the schedule.  They’re fun.  That’s what this is all supposed to be, isn’t it?  The people in charge at both universities need to start acting like adults and make this happen.

College sports are built on rivalries.

The University of Missouri and the University of Kansas actually owe it to their fans and alumni to resume the Border War.

Or, I guess we can all just wait around for those women’s softball games that may or may not happen in the Regional tournament.

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