Some University of Georgia football fans are taking their fandom to the next level ahead of a game between the Bulldogs and the Notre Dame Fighting Irish on Saturday night.
Dill’s Food City, a grocery store chain whose owners are known locally as die-hard Bulldogs fans, removed traces of the Irish before the big game day, starting with Irish Spring soaps.
“Sorry Dill’s customers there will be no Irish Spring at our stores this week. Go Dawgs!” the store in Royston, about 30 miles north of the University of Georgia campus in Athens, said on a Facebook post on Monday.
The post included photos of the owner taking the product off the shelves and replacing it with a Bulldogs-branded sign that says, “Temporarily out of Stock. Go Dawgs!”
Three days later, Irish Spring joined Twitter to react to the store’s post.
The soap company tweeted a photo of an Irish Soap shipment with Bulldog signs, saying, “Hey University of Georgia – Heard you were out of stock in Athens, GA. We’re sending a little luck your way. Hoping for a good, clean game tomorrow!”
The online back-and-forth brought smiles to some football fans, regardless of how serious they might be about the Georgia-Notre Dame rivalry.
“The fact that Irish Spring created an account just to get in on the #NDvsUGA pregame banter is one of the many reasons I absolutely love #CollegeFootball Twitter,” a University of Georgia graduate tweeted.
“This is hilarious…doesn’t matter who you’re pulling for #NDvsUGA,” another Twitter user posted.
The University of Georgia clapped back at Irish Spring, though with an apparently less humorous tone: “Commit to beating Notre Dame!“
Georgia ranks 3rd in the NCAA and Notre Dame 7th. Saturday’s game will kick off at 8 p.m. in Sanford Stadium in Athens. To accommodate the expected crowds of fans for both teams, the stadium will add 500 seats to its usual capacity of 92,746.
