The Seismograph: How Alabama and LSU fans freak out

Saturday night, No. 1 Alabama took a 14-3 lead over No. 5 LSU into halftime. Anyone who has watched these teams play know that their games tend to play out as 12-9 field goal festivals, and an 11-point lead in this game seemed like a 21-point lead in any other.

To everyone's shock, LSU scored not one, but two touchdowns in the second half. Suddenly, the Crimson Tide had to come up with a score of its own to preserve its undefeated record. What followed was one of the most memorable finishes of the 2012 college football season.

For myself, an impartial observer, this game was a ton of fun to watch. For those with a vested interest, this was a more complicated affair. In this episode of THE SEISMOGRAPH, we visit our Alabama blog, Roll Bama Roll, and our LSU blog, And The Valley Shook. The game threads from these blogs produced thousands of comments, and within, there was plenty of elation, cussing, despair, cussing, and cussing.

Let's see how and when the winning fans preferred to cuss.

There was very little cussin' going on at Roll Bama Roll until the second quarter, when LSU tried (and failed) a fake field goal, and Tide quarterback A.J. McCarron rushed in for a nine-yard score.

And then the Tigers scored at a breakneck pace -- which, by LSU-Bama standards, means they scored two touchdowns in a single half. The second came minutes after Alabama fumbled at the LSU 10-yard line, coughing up an opportunity to build a 21-10 lead. As you can see above, there was plenty of freaking out to be had.

Their stance on Tide-related affairs, however, was never in doubt.

In total, there was a staggering total of 132 "Roll Tide" comments. In fact, these accounted for seven percent of all Roll Bama Roll comments Saturday evening. They spiked at three predictable intervals: the opening kickoff, the start of the second half, and the end of the game.

Of course, we can't afford not to check in with our LSU fans. A heartbreaking, up-and-down loss inspired a lot of questions, and not many answers.

What is Gary Danielson ever talking about? Nobody knows, LSU fans, but it's worth asking anyway. Is the world ending? That is perhaps best answered by a clergyman. Why is A.J. McCarron crying? BECAUSE HE WON THE FOOTBALL GAME AND WINNING FOOTBALL GAMES MAKES PEOPLE HAPPY AND SOMETIMES PEOPLE CRY WHEN THEY ARE HAPPY.

OK, we've been fiddling with meaningless minutiae for long enough. On to serious matters:

Top 6 comments about beds or bedrooms

6. We are shitting the bed

5. We shitting the bed boys.

4. Win first half, shit the bed the second.

3. We go from confident in the 1st half to bed-shitting in the 2nd half?

2. It's one thing to just get beat, it's another to crap the bed.

1. Oh, they shit the bedroom against LSU in the regular season too?

For other episodes of THE SEISMOGRAPH, please see:

NFL fans hate their quarterbacks a whole lot!
The Jacksonville Jaguars are really sad!
Robert Griffin III is really awesome!
Florida State fans do not deal with upsets particularly well!

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