BY THE WAY: FOOTBALL TRADITION SUDDENLY UP FOR SALE

We had the chips and salsa to complement the beer in the fridge.

We had enough information on both teams and insight into the importance of this time-honored Southern rivalry to develop arguments throughout the game. We called it friendly fire.

We had two undefeated college teams, both ranked among the top 10 in anyone's poll.

One of these teams had serious notions of winning a national championship. One of the coaches, Gene Stallings, used to work for Bill Bidwill when his Cardinals were in St. Louis. Oh well, we all make mistakes in life, someone said.

The telephone? Take it off the hook. This, of course, after everyone tells the wife and kids where they can't be reached.

We even had our Keith Jackson imitations down pat. "We're gonna see some kind of head-buttin', head-crackin', toe-to-toe, smash-face football today," Jackson was wont to promise on so many of those crisp autumn afternoons as the commentator for ABC TV. Today would be no different, we thought.

It was a tradition we assumed would be around long enough to be passed on to another generation of armchair quarterbacks.

"It looks like...it is, F-U-M-B-L-E," roared our first Jackson wannabe. It sounded close, but not quite Jacksonesque. Gargle with some Listerine, then try it again, the rest of us advised our would-be TV commentator as we jockeyed for various positions around the television.

We grew up on that kind of stuff. Others call it male bonding. Huh, we called it an excuse for friends to stay in touch, to relive the high-school games we thought we played to the hilt. It was also an opportunity to gorge on food that suddenly is illegal for the arteries.

The longer we revived moments of the games we played, the more it seemed like they were becoming more important than the game we were about to watch.

The only thing that remained was the game itself. I'm talking about THE college football game of the year: the game that most of the bowls couldn't touch.

I'm talking Alabama versus Auburn. Marriages have been affected by the outcome. Jobs have been changed because people from the losing town couldn't handle the persistent reminders of who won THE GAME.

Just when we were getting comfortable, however, we heard an announcement that turned the room into a morgue. The next game to be televised by ABC would be Illinois versus Wisconsin. We would not be getting Alabama versus Auburn.

Someone spilled the chips on the floor. The salsa plunged into the carpet. The dog ran under the bed. It seemed like even the sun ran for cover behind the clouds. Someone thought they heard rumblings from the New Madrid Fault.

I told everyone not to panic. Perhaps this was a mistake. Maybe the announcement was meant for some other region.

To make sure, I called Beav, the trusty barmeister at the Playdium.

Beav, tell me it isn't so, I said with what must have sounded like a desperate voice. Beav informed me that the game would be televised only on a pay-per-view basis.

He said it was the wave of the future.

Suddenly Alabama versus Auburn wasn't the game it used to be. Sadly enough, a tradition we thought we were going to pass on to another generation was up for sale.

We decided it just wasn't the same.

I figured everyone would go home to the wife and kids. Just when I was about to place the phone back on the hook, someone shouted, "OK, what do we know about the Illinois-Wisconsin game?" Suddenly THE GAME was back on the tube.

Hold all calls until halftime.

Bill Heitland is a member of the Southeast Missourian staff.