Memphis feels just like home to Archie Manning

MEMPHIS - When AutoZone Liberty Bowl executive director Steve Ehrhart asked Southern college football icon Archie Manning several months ago if he would be the featured speaker at Sunday's AutoZone Liberty Bowl Legends dinner at The Peabody, the response was immediate.

"Right off the bat, I said, 'I'll be there,'" Manning said. "Memphis is just special to me. It was my first bowl game."

Manning, who is to Ole Miss football history as Billy Cannon is to LSU, Herschel Walker is to Georgia, Steve Spurrier is to Florida and Johnny Majors is to Tennessee, played in just one Liberty Bowl.

That happened in 1968 at the end of his sophomore season when Ole Miss came back from a 17-0 deficit for a 34-17 victory over Virginia Tech on a frigid mid-December afternoon.

"That was the coldest game I've ever played in," said Manning, 59, who spent 12 years in the NFL (mostly with the New Orleans Saints) and played in such bone-chilling places as Green Bay, Minnesota (before the Metrodome), Milwaukee and Buffalo. "We didn't think it was going to be that cold."

Manning, a true son of the South who was raised in Drew, Miss., has always had a passion for college football. That's why he has attended several AutoZone Liberty Bowls, including the first one played in Memphis in 1965 after the bowl moved from Atlantic City, N.J.

"I was a junior in high school and watched Auburn play Ole Miss (Ole Miss won, 13-7)," Manning said. "That was the second-coldest game I've ever been to. I absolutely froze to death."

And the following two years after Manning played in the Liberty Bowl, because the game was played in mid-December, he was able to attend the game as a spectator before he and the Rebels played in the Sugar Bowl after his junior year in '69 and the Gator Bowl in '70.

The Rebels came into the '68 Liberty Bowl with a 6-3-1 record, tying Mississippi State, 17-17, (the last time the in-state rivals tied in the series) in the season finale.

Manning said getting the Liberty Bowl invite was appealing for several reasons.

"I always loved coming to Memphis," said Manning, who finished his career with a 3-0 record (two regular season wins over Memphis) in Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium. "But what was great about playing in the Liberty Bowl at that time was the game was on the second Saturday in December. It meant you go to play in a bowl game, and you got to go home for Christmas."

Manning said he had a great time playing in the Liberty Bowl, despite the chilly temps that may have been a reason for what he felt was a subpar passing performance (12-of-28 for 141 yards, two touchdowns).

"I learned something that day," Manning said. "I wore a sweatshirt under my jersey and I felt like I didn't throw well. I never wore a sweatshirt in a game again, but it was really cold."

Maybe the cold contributed to the Rebels staring at a 17-0 deficit at the end of the first quarter. Manning recalled Virginia Tech scoring on a couple of trick plays.

"It sure wasn't looking good," Manning said. "I remember being on the sideline and they score. I say, 'What happened?' Everyone around me says, 'I don't know.'

"So we run down to the TV monitor on the sideline to watch a replay. We didn't know what happened. They came with no huddle, threw a ball out to a guy and scored, and ran another play off the sideline and scored."

But the Rebels didn't panic. That wasn't legendary Ole Miss coach Johnny Vaught's style, and his team had some solid senior leadership from such players as Hank Shows, Steve Hindman and Frank Trapp.

It was Shows who caught Manning's 24-yard TD pass early in the second quarter, after Ole Miss gained advantageous field position when Tech tried an onside kickoff following a field goal.

And after another Manning TD pass, this one 23 yards to Leon Felts, helped cut Tech's halftime lead to 17-14, it was game MVP Hindman's 79-yard TD run 21 seconds into the third quarter that fully changed game momentum.

"When you're down 17-0, you can say that you're going to get back in it," Manning said. "On the other hand, we could have been down by 40 if we didn't get it in gear.

"So to get a long (TD) play early in the second half gave us a lot of confidence. I was proud of the way we hung in. A lot of times in a bowl game, you can just fold your tent in adverse weather conditions. We had a lot of guys make big plays for us."

Getting the victory -- the second of Ole Miss' four Liberty Bowl wins (the Rebels, at 4-0, have more Liberty Bowl victories than any other team in the bowl's history) -- was important to the Southeastern Conference school geographically closest to Memphis.

"Back in those days, you had the big four bowls which were the Sugar, Cotton, Rose and Orange," Manning said. "If you couldn't play in one of the big four, why not go up the road to Memphis and play on Dec. 14?"

Eventually, Manning's Super Bowl MVP sons Peyton and Eli, both quarterbacked games in Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium against the University of Memphis.

Both came up empty, with Peyton's No. 6-ranked Tennessee team being shocked by the Tigers, 21-17, in 1996, while Eli's 2003 Ole Miss crew lost a 44-34 shootout.

"Both of their experiences there weren't as good as mine," said Archie, who still lives in New Orleans with his wife, Olivia, and who stays busy these days with speaking engagements and filming commercials with his sons. "We won and I had a lot of fun."