Click here for linkPaul W. Bryant once famously described tie games as being "like kissing your sister." Which couldn't possibly be an accurate statement since it doesn't quite capture the degree he despised tie outcomes. Bryant played in or coached college football for a half century and over a span of 536 total games there were just 26 ties, barely 5 percent.
Those games are the subject of David Shepard's 2002 book The Titan of Tuscaloosa: The Tie Games and Career of Paul Bear Bryant. While most accounts of the legendary coach's career focus on key matchups and standout games, the ties offer a peek into the oft-overlooked regular season contests that made up the bulk of his impressive record.
Shepard gives an account of each game and describes a coaching "lesson" each offers. He then provides a number of extremely interesting statistics about both Bryant's career as well as Alabama football in general....