I Should Have Today Off

Before the Big XII, before the corporate sponsor, before even the Cotton Bowl, there was the Texas Game.

It is Red River Rivalry Eve once more, and I am at work.  If I was still in college, I’d have the day off, because TPTB at the University of Oklahoma got tired of holding class on a day when half the student body was driving I-35 South.  I hate being an adult.

Enough grumbling. It’s OU-TX weekend again, y’all! (College football brings out my accent.  Even when I type, apparently.) Even though I’ve never been lucky enough to attend the game in person, nothing will stop me from following the game live from wherever I happen to be.  Even if I am stuck in a hotel room in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan listening to the play by play as it is relayed by my friend’s father over her cell phone.

But that was last year.  This year, I should actually be able to watch the game on TV — no small feat, considering I live in the Northeast and Penn State is a top ten team this year.  But since this is the fifth time in the history of the rivalry that both teams are ranked in the Top 5 — guess who is number one? — not much is going to stop this game from reaching a national audience.

I don’t know why I love this particular football game so much.  Perhaps it’s because it’s a rivalry game that happens every year (unlike Nebraska) and doesn’t involve me having to watch the game in a room full of the opposing team’s fans, most of whom I’m related to (unlike Oklahoma State).  It’s usually OU’s (and sometimes Texas’s, too) first big test of the season, in recent years it’s often had conference and national title implications, and let’s face it, those aerial shots of a half red-half orange stadium are just freakin’ cool.  Plus, if the Sooners score ten points this week, they’ll become the first college football program to score 30,000 total points.  And it’s been 10 years since OU hasn’t scored at least ten points in the Texas game, so there’s a better than average chance they’ll do so on Saturday.

Superstition — and the absolute mess I made of my World Series picks last week — prevents me from doing too much advance trash talking, though.  Let’s look at some pictures!

Sophomore QB Sam Bradford. He has a lovely smile.

Senior RB Chris Ogbonnaya kind of scares me.

Junior Tight End Jermaine Gresham shows off his stiff arm.

Senior WR Jordan Shipley's had some big games in the Cotton Bowl.

Senior WR Juaquin Iglesias had fun at last year's game.

OK, I'm jealous, Mack. Just this once.

Go Sooners!