There was a time when no football game mattered more than Yale squaring off against Harvard. It was a time when there wasn't any penicillin to cure the infections that came from having your facemask-less mug slammed into the turf.

Fast forward half a century and there was a time when the hottest ticket in Big Ten basketball was Nick Anderson's Illini battling Glen Rice's Wolverines. Now, well, let's just say Demetri McCamey and Manny Harris aren't fueling quite the same anticipatory fires.

The point is rivalries change. So rather than roll out Duke-North Carolina and Michigan-Ohio State and call it a summer, Pat Forde ranks the hottest rivalries in college football and college basketball at this moment (and talks to Ivan Maisel and Andy Katz, left). Plus, who doesn't like seeing Wolverines fans getting scarlet in the face with rage?

jec332

Washington vs. Washington State over Penn State vs. Ohio State. Seriously? What a joke. A rivalry that is completely irrelevant can't be heated. Washington won, what, no games last year. Washington State won one. It's called a pillow fight, not a rivalry. The Penn State-Ohio State game should easily be in the top 10.

-- jec332
omagus

For everyone complaining about which rivalries are not included, did you read the intro? He said which rivalries are most heated NOW. As in *right* now. As in today. If the Clemson and South Carolina fight had happened last season, I bet that rivalry would be included. And if Miami ever becomes more than an average team again and can give Florida a real challenge, I bet that one would be included too.

-- omagus
schave33

This is stupid. Everyone knows that Duke/UNC is the biggest rivalry in basketball and probably top 5 in all of sports in general. Forde needs a serious reality check if he thinks otherwise. Exactly what has Kentucky done the last 5 years? Oh that's right, they were losing in the NIT. Other than Michigan State, what has any of the teams done in that span. Nothing!!!

-- schave33

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