#3 Alabama were 10-0 and #5 Auburn were 9-0 when they met at Legion Field on 27 November 1971. It was the first Iron Bowl between two unbeaten teams and the first between two top-five teams.
A Heisman two days old
Pat Sullivan had been named the Heisman Trophy winner on Thanksgiving Day, 25 November — two days before this game, announced at half-time of the Georgia-Georgia Tech game. He won the vote 1,597 points to Ed Marinaro’s 1,445. His last college appearance in a regular-season game was therefore made as the reigning Heisman winner, and it went badly: 14 completions from 27 attempts for 121 yards, two interceptions and no touchdowns.
The scoring
Terry Davis ran in touchdowns from six and eleven yards in the first quarter. Auburn’s only score came on a trick play in the second, Harry Unger throwing 31 yards to Terry Beasley, and it was 14-7 at half-time. Nothing was scored in the third quarter. In the fourth Alabama added 17 unanswered points: a 41-yard Bill Davis field goal and two Johnny Musso touchdown runs, the first from twelve yards.
The wishbone’s first year
Alabama had installed the wishbone over the summer of 1971, after Bryant sent assistants to Texas to learn it, and had kept it hidden until the season opener. The 1971 Iron Bowl was the eleventh and last game of that first wishbone season, and the offence did to Auburn what it had done to everyone else: held the ball, ran the ball, and did not turn it over.
Afterwards
Alabama finished 11-1 and won the conference outright at 7-0, losing the Orange Bowl to Nebraska 38-6 on 1 January. Auburn finished 9-2, losing the Sugar Bowl to Oklahoma 40-22 the same day. Both bowl results were heavy, and both teams had been better all season than the first week of January suggested.