Ohio State (Big 10) 2017

College:  The Ohio State University

Year:       2017

Game:     Oklahoma 31 Ohio State 16

Rating:    8
Cost Index:  High
Tickets:  Moderate, there were tickets available walking around before the game

Stadium:  The Horseshoe

If you want to make it part of a larger trip:  Cleveland, Kentucky, University of Cincinnati, Toledo, 
Don't Miss:  The Horseshoe...other than that Columbus is pretty basic

Avoid:      Nightlife is weak, be careful when you take a shower at Alum Creek State park

Attendees:  Bones, The Wrestler

Ohio State has long been a target for me, primarily because I fucked it up in 2010.  I was supposed to go with a couple of friends and I let the tickets slide after getting too drunk on Friday night...one of the few failures over the years.  Fortunately for us it wasn't a classic game or anything, Ohio State blew them out 38-16.

I went a couple of years ago but the game was against Illinois so it was more like watching a high school game between a wealthy Catholic school and a poorly funded city school.  It wasn't competitive.  I can handle that if it's a MAC game but not if it's a top 5 spot like the Horseshoe.  This year, for me, is a lot about cleaning up previous mistakes so when this game went on sale in June and I was able to grab a face value ticket (190 face!) so I took the opportunity.

In addition this was the first game I attended with someone I met FROM THIS BLOG.  I don't know him that well, and all folks on this blog are anonymous, so I will call him THE WRESTLER because he wrestled in college. The nickname can always be updated later.  As far as I know this blog has exactly two people who read it so I consider this somewhat of an accomplishment.  My audience interaction metric is approximately 50%!

We got in Friday night.  Took me forever to drive there from Chicago because I dislike driving I-65.  I refuse to do it, so I drove across Indiana instead of down to Indianapolis and over.  I got in and met up with THE WRESTLER at Club 185.  It was a decent place, was supposed to be in the hot neighborhood in Columbus called The German Village.  We ended up bouncing around to a few different bars in the area, I was not impressed, especially for the night before a big football game.  The main problem:  I am 43 years old and I felt young in all of the bars we were at (well, except for the first one, in that one I just felt appropriate).  The Wrestler is younger and at the last place he had to talk to a couple of ancient Zombie looking women. This was at the High Beck Tavern. Strike one against the nightlife.  We went up to High Street and founds some nameless place that was younger and loud.  At least that is what a college should be, but I still was not impressed.

At no point over the weekend did I ever think to myself "I really wish I had gone to school at Ohio State". Places I have wished that I went to school at:  Tennessee, The University of Washington and The University of Wisconsin.

One aside: What is this bullshit insisting on calling the school THE Ohio State University. Fuck that.

An overall observation on nightlife in general:  Its become very lacking in personality.  Bars seem to be trying to offer style over substance, they are all trying to out do one another with how fancy they are instead of trying to offer anything unique.  The result is a bunch of places that are too loud or too driven by decor.  In general, I find them boring.  

Game Day:  We stayed at Alum Creek State Park, about 30 mins north of Columbus (15 miles).  Stayed in a cabin for 50 bucks a night.  The Cabin had A/C and a TV!  In a State Park!  I have never seen this before.  

I did have one funny moment there.  When I was shaving after I took a shower some guy was in the stalls taking a shit.  It sounded like there was a power lifting competition going on in there.  When the dude was done he walked immediately from the stall into the showers.  This dude was somewhere between 350 and 400 lbs. I think we've all had that nasty shit where we felt an immediate shower was necessary but I had never seen anyone execute this move since my friend Bob (he famously took a shower every time he took a shit).  I don't know why these things entertain me, but they do!

We started out the day by getting lunch at a local spot called Brewzaa (a play on words, get it?).  The pregnant bartender was great, she didn't ply us with any of the overly polite bullshit (Hi I'm Ashley and I'LL BE YOUR SERVER TODAY!)....she was very appropriately disinterested...food wasn't bad at this place. There were some good games on, the best being Iowa @ Iowa State in which Iowa State lost to Iowa as only Iowa State can.  We got out of there and headed down to Columbus about 2 hours before the game.

Scene outside the stadium was very average. They had the obligatory outdoor parties on Lane avenue.  Tired bands wearing Ohio State jerseys playing tired songs I've heard 100x before.  Walking through the tail gate lots for a bit....very average.  If I didn't know any better I would have though Ohio State was playing Kent State and not Oklahoma. We decided to head into the game about an hour before kickoff.

The game itself saved this particular trip, it was much more competitive that the final score would indicate.

Let's start with Ohio Stadium:  the architecture is both unique and majestic.  We had really good seats, you get a good view of the game from most of the seats in there.  When you are watching the game it's as good as anywhere I've been. The stadium is old and therefore the concourses and the bathrooms are a bit sub par, but it would be difficult to fix this without a Texas A&M style renovation.  The pissers are really weird, the only other place I've seen this is in the upper deck at Wrigley.  You piss in a troth in the center of the room, so you get to make awkward eye contact with another dude while you are both pissing. Not a big deal, but they should modernize that at some point.  

On the field:  Oklahoma came in there with the perception that they were less talented.  After watching this game I'm not so sure as I think they have a great QB and a great O-line (and therefore a great Offense).  They came in their with a superior game plan and stuck to it.   The score was 3-3 at halftime...I've never seen a more exciting game that was 3-3 at halftime.  Ohio State had a nice kickoff return at the beginning of the third quarter and scored a TD. Oklahoma then dominated the rest of the game on both sides of the ball.  

Ohio State usually has such a talent gap that they generally don't bother game planning (Alabama is the same way).  They just play their system and that is usually good enough.  In this case they were severely out coached on both sides of the ball.  I also think they are bit over rated.  I never thought I was watching the number two team in the country, especially on the Offensive side of the ball.  

Evidently at the end of the game Baker Mayfield planted the OU flag on the Ohio State logo.  Haha!  Then he had to issue a lame apology.  I wish the PR departments at these schools would fuck right off.  

Some observations not related to on field play:

• Never noticed the student section, they didn't do anything fun, weren't that loud
• Overall, the crowd was not that loud at all.  Last time I was there I thought it was loud, but I was sitting under a concrete overhang so that had to have something to do with it.  Maybe they weren't drunk enough. 
• The fans were every bit as short sighted and dumb as their reputation.  The guys behind me clearly didn't know the rules when they were criticizing the refs.  They guy next to me kept yelling various insults about licking assholes, so you know where his mind was at.  There was a sloppy kid and his sloppy girlfriend behind me, he kept mentioning how he used to play football.  My only thought regarding this comment was that he must have played on a really shitty team because he looked about as athletic as the fat slob I sit across from at work.  I, like most people, don't like Ohio State so it was very satisfying to see them lose and hear their fans whine about it. 
• They get a raging boner over the song "Hang on Sloopy" which is the official rock song of the state of Ohio.   If that's the best rock song produced by your state my recommendation would be to get out there and write more songs.  Turns out it wasn't even written by Ohioans:

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hang_On_Sloopy

          Fuck that song with a 10 foot branch off a Buckeye tree.

Ohio State is a spot everyone should go to and I'm glad I did it, but I won't be heading back unless one of my friends are dying to check it out.  Outside of the game, I found Columbus boring. 

Game Recap: http://www.espn.com/college-football/game?gameId=400934502