Alabama football legend Johnny Musso didn’t have to be reminded that it’s Tennessee week.

“I’ve got a cigar waiting,” Musso said prior to a speaking engagement at the University of Mobile on Thursday.

Musso starred at running back for the Crimson Tide from 1969-71, finishing his college career as the school’s all-time leading rusher. A first-team All-American and SEC Player of the Year as a senior, he was part of an Alabama team that reversed a three-year downward trend for coach Paul “Bear” Bryant’s program and won the first of five straight conference championships.

One of Alabama’s 11 victories that year came over Tennessee on the Third Saturday in October, a 32-15 win at Legion Field in Musso’s hometown of Birmingham. He ran for 115 yards and a touchdown as the Crimson Tide snapped a four-year losing streak to the Volunteers, who wouldn’t beat Alabama again until 1982.

“Tennessee was just a huge game,” said Musso, nicknamed “The Italian Stallion” a half-decade before Sylvester Stallone co-opted the moniker for the Rocky movie franchise. “It was just big. It wasn’t as big as Auburn, but it was the second-biggest game we played. My first two years as a varsity player, ‘69 and ‘70, we really didn’t have the results or the standard that the teams before us had, or the ones after us. We turned that around my senior year, but those first two years, we struggled some. And we got the brunt of the other team’s wins, because, boy, if they could beat Alabama, they’d beat us as much as they could, they’d put our face in the dirt if they could.

“… Those were hard years, and we got beat up some. But I’m just grateful that I got to be part of that ‘71 team. The group that I was recruited with was a great group of people and athletes, and the group behind us were a great group of athletes. And so my senior year, we had a good team and we were able to do well and see some success that Alabama had known in the past. So it was really gratifying to me, because I got to see both sides of it.”

After his Alabama career ended, Musso played in the Canadian Football League, the World Football League and with the NFL’s Chicago Bears. Following a series of knee injuries, he retired prior to the 1979 season at age 29.

Musso still makes his primary home in Chicago, where he has enjoyed a highly successful career as a commodities trader. He said he took many of the lessons he learned from Bryant into his business and personal life.

“I think one of the best lessons I learned from him — there are several — but one was to live expectantly, to expect to be alert,” Musso said. “He always said that a ball game comes down to two or three plays, whoever wins those two or three key plays is going to win the game. You spend hours and hours, years and years, in preparation for the game and it comes down to a couple of plays. But the problem is, you don’t know when those plays are coming, they don’t announce themselves, they could be any time of the game. And so you have to play every play as if it’s going to be the play that determines the game.

“… I found that, in my business career, there was a turning point. There was one thing that was the most important thing and that happened when a guy introduced himself to me and became a mentor. And if I hadn’t have been expecting, looking for something, hoping for something, expecting maybe something I wouldn’t have pursued that. (Bryant) prepared young people to face the future, and to me, that was just one of the things he taught that helped me and affected how I lived.”

Musso appeared at the University of Mobile for its annual “Partners for Purpose” luncheon, one of the school’s primary fundraisers. Having worked in youth ministry for many years in addition his business career, he said he feels an obligation to “pass on my story” to the younger generation, in hopes of inspiring and encouraging them to excel in their own future endeavors.

Now 73, Musso splits his time between Chicago and Florida. He still follows Alabama football closely, and like many others is amazed at the run his alma mater has had under Nick Saban.

“It’s most impressive,” Musso said. “There’s no way to downplay it. He’s a great coach. He’s, in my opinion, the best coach that ever coached, and I don’t say that in a way that would demean what coach Bryant did. There was never a personality, a person like (Bryant). He’s a one of a kind and is unique.

“But coach Saban’s standard and the way he consistently pursues excellence and the influence he has on players is unique and it is the best.”