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State College Beat
Bitter rivalry has seen it all
Ripon, Lawrence provide fireworks
By ART KABELOWSKY
of the Journal Sentinel staff
Friday, November 3, 2000
The relationship has been contentious and snippy, mean and nasty, even physically violent.
Yet here they go again, ready to romp in the crisp autumn afternoon air for the 100th time.
The football teams from Ripon College and Lawrence College have been going steady, on and off, since 1893. At 1 p.m. Saturday at Ripon's Ingalls Field, the Red Hawks and Vikings will extend the state's oldest college football rivalry by getting together for the 100th time.
And entering this rematch, nothing has been settled. The series is tied, 46-46-7, although Ripon has outscored Lawrence in the series, 1,468-1,405.
Over the years, the rivalry has produced blowouts and nail- biters, high jinks and hooliganism, friendships and memories. More than half a dozen times, the schools vowed never to play each other again.
One fledgling sportswriter even opined that the rivalry might bring about the death of football. From a story in the Lawrence student newspaper in 1896 detailing Ripon's 58-4 victory:
"The game was foul and rough from start to finish. Ripon repeatedly slugged, to which the umpire was blind -- pugilism, kneeism and heelism, not football. Such playing will kill football. If Ripon or football...