SEC football history: Recalling the most obscure opponent for all 16 teams

We don't have to go back far for this one as the Gators hosted the Long Island Sharks to open the 2025 campaign, posting a 55-0 win.

In postgame comments, then-Florida coach Billy Napier referred to it as "a scrimmage" and a way to help quarterback DJ Lagway shake off the rust after injuries slowed his offseason progress. After being sacked on the game's first play, Lagway threw for 120 yards and three touchdown passes in limited action.

It was a tough day all around for Long Island, which racked up more penalty yards (100) than total offensive yards (86).

Georgia Bulldogs

A crossover between the SEC and Ivy League might seem strange now, but it was a near-annual occurrence from 1923-34 as Georgia and Yale met annually on the gridiron (with all but one of those games contested at the Yale Bowl). During those 11 matchups, Georgia narrowly won the series, 6-5.

Although Georgia won the overall series, Yale drew first blood with a 40-0 home win over the Bulldogs on Oct. 13, 1923. It was the first loss of the year for Georgia on its way to a 5-3-1 record.

Kentucky Wildcats

Kentucky State College (which would become the University of Kentucky) opened its 1902 football season with a 22-0 victory over Q&C Railroad on Sept. 27 in Lexington. The opponent was an unusual entry on the schedule for a college team, but the result gave Kentucky a winning start under first-year coach E.W. McLeod.

The next day, The Lexington Leader reported the result under the headline, "Railroad eleven defeated 22 to 0." The newspaper noted that "State College" furnished three substitutes to the railroad team, which was otherwise unable to field 11 players.

LSU Tigers

LSU took college football overseas on Christmas Day 1907, traveling to Cuba for a matchup with the University of Havana. The Tigers left little doubt about the difference between the two teams, rolling to a 56-0 victory at Almendares Park in a matchup that would later be known as the start of the Bacardi Bowl's seven-game run.

The contest nearly fell apart after the original promoter withdrew, but local organizers helped ensure it went ahead. An estimated 4,200 spectators watched LSU make history, with standout George "Doc" Fenton among the players who helped power the Tigers’ dominant performance.

Mississippi Rebels

Ole Miss found an unexpectedly tough foe in the Tennessee Doctors, a football team based in Memphis and affiliated with the University of Tennessee's College of Medicine. The Rebels won the first six meetings between the teams from 1903-12. But the medics later handed Ole Miss back-to-back losses in 1921 and '22 while outscoring the Rebels 56-6 in aggregate.

The Tennessee Doctors were no rollover opponent. They went undefeated three consecutive seasons in the 1920s.

Mississippi State Bulldogs

On Sept. 18, 2004, Mississippi State scored a first-quarter touchdown against Maine ... and wouldn't score again that day. 

The Black Bears kicked a third-quarter field goal to pull within 7-3, then Maine's Ron Whitcomb threw a 16-yard touchdown pass to Kevin McMahan with 7:16 left in the game to provide the 9-7 winning margin.

It was the second of five consecutive losses for the Bulldogs on their way to a 3-8 finish under Sylvester Croom.

Missouri Tigers

Missouri's early football history included a surprising series against the Kirksville Osteopaths, a team representing the American School of Osteopathy in Kirksville, Mo.

The Tigers opened the two-game series with a 13-0 victory in Columbia on Oct. 1, 1900, but the Osteopaths turned the tables the following season. On Oct. 5, 1901, Kirksville handed Missouri a 22-5 defeat at Rollins Field.

Kirksville still exists. It's now known as A.T. Still University, but it does not sponsor intercollegiate sports.

Oklahoma Sooners

Based in Norman, the Sooners didn't have to go far to find a regular opponent during the 1890s, 1900s and 1910s. Kingfisher College was just 67 miles away on the other side of Oklahoma City.

The Sooners took advantage of their dates against the regional foe, posting an overall 19-0-3 mark in the series.

The three ties were all scoreless games, but the Sooners didn't have trouble scoring in the other matchups. On Sept. 29, 1917, the Sooners defeated Kingfisher 179–0, one of the most lopsided scores in college football history.

South Carolina Gamecocks

From 1903 through '05, South Carolina opposed Welch Neck Academy from Hartsville, S.C. That school is now known as Coker University and competes in NCAA Division II sports.

The Gamecocks outscored Welsh Neck 117-0 in their three meetings. The 1904 and '05 games were both 14-0 affairs, a marked improvement from the 89-0 bludgeoning by South Carolina in the first meeting.

Tennessee Volunteers

One of Tennessee's most atypical matchups came against American Temperance University, a school in Harriman, Tenn., founded around the movement to ban alcohol in the 1800s.

The Volunteers overwhelmed the visitors, 104-0, in Knoxville on Oct. 7, 1905, delivering one of the most lopsided victories in school history. The teams met twice more in 1906, with Tennessee winning 10-0 in Knoxville before the schools played to a 5-5 tie in Harriman.

Texas Longhorns

Texas went unbeaten in 1918, finishing 9-0, but its schedule included several opponents that reflected the unusual circumstances of the World War I era.

The Longhorns defeated Penn Radio School twice, 25-0 on Oct. 13 and 22-7 on Oct. 27. Then they beat a Ream Field squad, 26-2 on Nov. 3 and shut out Camp Mabry Auto School, 22-0 on Nov. 13. All three opponents were associated with military training as wartime demands brought specialized schools and training camps into the orbit of college football.

Those three wins helped Texas stay perfect under coach William Juneau, with the Longhorns allowing just 14 points across nine games and claiming the Southwest Conference title.

Texas A&M Aggies

Texas A&M’s 1904 schedule included a season-opening matchup with the Texas Deaf School in College Station. On Oct. 8, the Aggies posted a 49-0 shutout, the start of what would be a 4-2 record that season under J.E. Platt.

The Aggies would log additional shutouts against Baylor (twice) and Texas Christian but also suffered losses to Sewanee (Tenn.) and rival Texas.

Vanderbilt Commodores

Vanderbilt's trip to New York in October 1935 ended with a loss to a Fordham team featuring a future football legend.

The Commodores fell 13-7 to the Rams on Oct. 19 at New York's Polo Grounds, where Vince Lombardi was helping lead Fordham's imposing offensive line. Lombardi was still a college player, years away from building his coaching legacy with the Green Bay Packers, but he was already part of a legendary position unit known as the Seven Blocks of Granite.

Yardbarker editor Thomas Neumann contributed to this article.