Steve Sloan threw three touchdown passes at Legion Field on 27 November 1965, and #5 Alabama took the conference title with the win.
The scoring
Sloan threw 11 yards to Tommy Tolleson and 33 yards to Ray Perkins, and David Ray kicked a 27-yard field goal, for a 15-0 lead. Auburn’s only points came from a 44-yard Don Lewis field goal before the interval, making it 15-3 at half-time. Leslie Kelley ran in from two yards in the third quarter, and Sloan’s third touchdown pass, 29 yards to Don Shankles, closed the scoring in the fourth.
An unusual national championship
Alabama finished the regular season 9-1-1 and ranked fourth. The Associated Press had moved its final poll to after the bowl games for 1965, and on 1 January Alabama beat Nebraska 39-28 in the Orange Bowl while the teams ranked above them lost. Alabama finished first in the final AP poll — a national championship won in the first week of January rather than the last week of November.
The 1965 title is therefore the mirror image of the one Alabama had been given in 1964, when the polls closed early and the Orange Bowl defeat did not count. Two consecutive championships, decided by two different rules.
Auburn’s season
Auburn finished 5-5-1, though 4-1-1 in conference play, and lost the Liberty Bowl to Ole Miss 13-7 on 18 December. It was Shug Jordan’s fifteenth season and his first non-winning one since 1952.