2015 CORTACA CENTRAL                2015 CORTLAND GAME NOTES
ITHACA, N.Y. — Ithaca College and Cortland were already big football rivals heading into the 1959 season. The two schools first played a competitive football game on Oct. 18, 1930, with Cortland earning a 12-0 shutout victory.
 
The Red Dragons dominated the early years of the rivalry, as Ithaca went 4-9-3 in the first 16 meetings.
 
Then, before the 1959 meeting, Cortland captain Tom Decker stopped at a yard sale and purchased a $2 jug from a farmer that he thought could be used as a trophy during the annual game between two schools separated by only 21 miles.
 
After meeting up with friend and Ithaca football captain Dick Carmean, the two painted the jug blue, gold, red, and white in honor of both schools' colors. The original Jug ran out of room for scores in the mid-1980s.
 
While the styles of football have certainly changed during the course of the rivalry, one constant remains: student-athletes on both schools want nothing more than to earn a win over their rival.
 
This rivalry is about more than just a football game. It is about pride, respect, tradition, and school spirit. No matter what a team's record is entering the Cortaca Jug, winning the Jug can make a season, or it can break it, and the passionate fans on both sides only add to the tenacity of the rivalry.
 
There is a reason Sports Illustrated once used the phrase "Biggest Little Game in the Nation" when describing Cortaca in 1991, and after all these years, the Cortaca Jug still represents all that we love about sports.
 
The 57^th annual Cortaca Jug game kicks off at 12 p.m. Saturday from Butterfield Stadium, with Ithaca (4-5, 2-5 Empire 8) looking to snap a five-game skid against Cortland (7-2, 5-2).
 
This year, the age-old rivalry was given a new wrinkle as for the first time, the two schools are members of the Empire 8 conference, and this game will help determine the conference champion.

"Cortaca is a larger-than-life game, especially now that Cortland is in our conference," said senior defensive end Logan Murphy, one of Ithaca's three captains.

"Our season hasn't been what we wanted it to be, but we are still going to come out and play as hard as we can to win back the Jug. A 5-5 record looks a lot better than a 4-6 record, and winning the Cortaca Jug has been one of our goals all season."

Before each game, past gridiron stars from Ithaca College will address the current crop of football student-athletes, a tradition that Murphy said is embraced and welcomed in the locker room. While each guest speaker has a different background, Murphy said they all try and leave the same impression on the current team.

"We've always had alumni coming into our locker room and talking to us before the game to get us hyped up, and they always leave us with one message: beat Cortland," Murphy said. "It goes a long way for the alums to see us beat Cortland. With such an intense rivalry like this, this is definitely a rivalry that lives on long past the end of your playing days. It's a huge goal for us to win on Saturday."
 
The game draws national attention for both schools: During Saturday's College Game Day broadcast, ESPN will dedicate air time to the Cortaca Jug when discussing the best college football rivalries in the country.
 
Two past Ithaca football greats — Larry Turel '66 and Jeff Wittman '93 — reflected back on their memories of Cortaca.
 
Turel, who was a captain on the undefeated 1965 Ithaca squad (8-0), won two of the three Cortaca Jug contests during his playing days. He said his favorite Cortaca Jug memory came during that 1965 season as Ithaca rallied from a 12-0 halftime deficit with a pair of second-half touchdowns to win 13-12. That victory sparked Ithaca to its only unbeaten season in school history.
 
"That 1965 Cortaca win was something special. Trailing 12-0 at halftime, we all came out of the locker room fired up and ready to play after the halftime speech from coach Dick Lyon," recalled Turel.
 
"We all came together for that win, the biggest win of our season. To this day, whenever we get together as a team, we talk about that game more than any other one. The thing with Cortaca is, it was and still is such a big game that every student-athlete on both sides of the field will remember those games. It is THE game."
 
Wittman, a fullback on Hall of Fame coach Jim Butterfield's teams from 1989-1992, was a three-time First-Team All-American who rushed for a school-record 3,410 yards and 44 touchdowns in his Bomber career.
 
During his playing days, Wittman led Ithaca to its second national championship in 1991, earning Stagg Bowl MVP honors after rushing for three touchdowns during a 34-20 triumph against Dayton in the title game.
 
Aside from winning a national championship, Wittman said the pure joy he and his teammates experienced earning three Cortaca victories stands out as his favorite memories from his playing career.
 
"Cortaca is the common bond for any of us who played football at Ithaca," said Wittman, a member of Ithaca's Athletics Hall of Fame. "Every Cortaca game was special. While I have trouble remembering other games we played, I'll always remember the specifics from every Cortland game. As a freshman, you don't realize the magnitude of the rivalry, but once you walk out of Ceracche and all you hear is the fans yelling and screaming, you realize how special Cortaca is. This game brings out the best in you and elevates your play to the next level."
 
As head coach Mike Welch, who has played in and coached 36 Cortaca Jugs put it during the annual Cortaca pregame press conference: "We play for a Jug. Not hundreds of thousands of dollars, we play for a Jug."

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