Modern sports television began in Athens, Georgia on September 18, 1965 when the University of Georgia Bulldogs took on Alabama’s Crimson Tide at Sanford Stadium. The game, broadcast on ABC, was the first nationally televised game for Georgia, AND the start of Roone Arledge’s “Big Idea”. His famous 1960 memo to Ed Scherick, which laid out his ideas on how to “bring the viewer to the ballgame” is hard to find, but here it is…it starts with the indented part of this first page and finishes at the top of the third page. 

After that is the description of how Roone put it into practice in Athens that crisp fall afternoon when he took the helm in the truck and produced that season’s first game. Going forward, all the ABC producers were were busy incorporating these new measures into their game presentations.  

Luck was with Roone and The Bulldogs that day, because at the very last minute, Georgia coach Vince Dooley called a trick play and won the game with an 18 to 17 victory over Bear Bryant. Here is that now famous 22-second play. Many thanks to author Marc Gunther for his great 1994 book “The House That Roone Built: The Inside Story of ABC News”. It is a great behind-the-scenes account of how Roone Arledge transformed ABC’s sports, and later their news division and draws on interviews with top network personnel to examine Arledge’s willingness to experiment and to spend money on talent.