1) Attending the CCG was an amazing experience, and I'm so glad I did it. The hype and the building excitement was incredible.
2) I'd say we had about 30% of the crowd, the rest of which was scarlet. Being outnumbered 70/30 (which is also what the TV broadcast estimated, I'm told) may not seem that impressive, but 30% of 67,000 (2nd highest attendance in the game's history) is...20,000 fans. That's really, really good for a small private school of 8,000 students. It's the most 'Cats fans I've ever seen in one place outside of Ryan Field, despite our strong showings at bowl games in San Antonio, NYC, Nashville, Tampa, Jacksonville, etc. And we were LOUD. You can hear it on the highlights...when we scored to pull to within 3, it was pandemonium. It wasn't just the students who were jumping around like crazy A very cool memory.
3) The Ohio State fans I interacted with were generally pretty civil and polite. A few bad apples, but it could have been much worse.
4) This team could have been overwhelmed and packed it up after a disappointing first half, which was shambolic on both sides of the ball (aside from the Moten TD run). Instead, they came out firing in the 3rd quarter, leading to ~20 minutes of thrilling football. I'm proud of them & this program. I waited until the game was over to applaud the team as they ran off.
5) The more talented team -- by a significant margin -- won, pulling away late. We couldn't compete with their freakshow QB, who was unstoppable. Being banged up in our secondary in the 2nd half sure didn't help. He also had ALL DAY to throw. No wonder he carved us up. Would have preferred to see more attempts at blitzing and other stunts because we were getting gashed regardless. Way too much time. And I say that as a big fan of Hank.
6) NU 100% deserved to be in this game. We would have been neck-and-neck, or would have beaten, anyone else in the conference in that game, IMO. This was a special season, and I hope we keep the trajectory moving in the right direction, starting with a *bowl win.* I hope our alumni show up for the 'Cats wherever we end up. They're the 2018 B1G West champs and they deserve our support. Plus, a win would put us averaging exactly 9 wins per year over the past four years. We can improve, but that's a relative golden age, given our program's history.
Go 'Cats.
2) I'd say we had about 30% of the crowd, the rest of which was scarlet. Being outnumbered 70/30 (which is also what the TV broadcast estimated, I'm told) may not seem that impressive, but 30% of 67,000 (2nd highest attendance in the game's history) is...20,000 fans. That's really, really good for a small private school of 8,000 students. It's the most 'Cats fans I've ever seen in one place outside of Ryan Field, despite our strong showings at bowl games in San Antonio, NYC, Nashville, Tampa, Jacksonville, etc. And we were LOUD. You can hear it on the highlights...when we scored to pull to within 3, it was pandemonium. It wasn't just the students who were jumping around like crazy A very cool memory.
3) The Ohio State fans I interacted with were generally pretty civil and polite. A few bad apples, but it could have been much worse.
4) This team could have been overwhelmed and packed it up after a disappointing first half, which was shambolic on both sides of the ball (aside from the Moten TD run). Instead, they came out firing in the 3rd quarter, leading to ~20 minutes of thrilling football. I'm proud of them & this program. I waited until the game was over to applaud the team as they ran off.
5) The more talented team -- by a significant margin -- won, pulling away late. We couldn't compete with their freakshow QB, who was unstoppable. Being banged up in our secondary in the 2nd half sure didn't help. He also had ALL DAY to throw. No wonder he carved us up. Would have preferred to see more attempts at blitzing and other stunts because we were getting gashed regardless. Way too much time. And I say that as a big fan of Hank.
6) NU 100% deserved to be in this game. We would have been neck-and-neck, or would have beaten, anyone else in the conference in that game, IMO. This was a special season, and I hope we keep the trajectory moving in the right direction, starting with a *bowl win.* I hope our alumni show up for the 'Cats wherever we end up. They're the 2018 B1G West champs and they deserve our support. Plus, a win would put us averaging exactly 9 wins per year over the past four years. We can improve, but that's a relative golden age, given our program's history.
Go 'Cats.
