Been there, won that

[maryland husker]

Just got back from Wake after the 6 hour ride home, and thought I would share my story on the trip and take on the game. Just the facts, ma'am....

 

Pictures of the trip are uploaded here

 

Left Frederick late Friday morning in order to meet with the Big Brothers/Big Sisters of Winston-Salem representative (Rebecca) to turn over the remaining season ticket package before she closed for the weekend. Set the cruise control for "high speed, low drag" and headed down I-81. Kind of disappointed I didn't see more Husker fans on the way. I passed only one other fan car (VA tag 4HUSKRZ). This certainly wasn't like other road trips to away games in recent history where we would pick up a convoy along the way.

 

The trip came to an abrupt halt when I rounded a curve in Blacksburg and saw Mr. Pooper Trooper looking right at me. Yup - flashbacks to Smoky and the Bandit. Him: "Did you know you were going 80 in a 65?" Me: "Errr, Uh, Umm...." I'll call tomorrow to see how much THAT'S going to cost me, but it wasn't as bad as my friends who were busted about the same time I was over on I-95 in Richmond for 84 in a 65. Anything over 15MPH over the limit is automatic wreckless driving in VA. (Insert Agent Maxwell Smart imitation here - "missed it by THAT much!")

 

Anyway, I wondered if Mr. Trooper knew that VaTech is on our schedule next year and was just trying to piss me off, but let it go. Also thought about asking him if he could hook me up with some tix for '09. It's never too late to start networking, ya know.

 

So back on the road, the cruise is now set down a notch at Warp 1 and Scottie is happy. That is until we come to a complete stop just outside of W-S because of a car-b-que up ahead. Next to us is a big shiney Sedan DeVille with Nebraska plates, so we roll down the window to chat. A very nice elderly couple from Ralston who have been here a couple of days already. Travel to all the games.... blah, blah, blah. But it passes the time until the local VFD does their thing and we are on our way again. By now I know I'm going to be late, but a phone call to Rebecca assures me she will wait until I can get there.

 

Google maps is right on the money with directions, and we are in Rebecca's office by 5:30 - 6 hours flat after leaving Maryland. Not bad for 380 miles and one pee/gas stop, one food stop, one cop stop, and one fire stop. Pictures, handshakes, a donation form for the IRS and we are on our way again to the Mariott in Greensboro. The next day, the Winston-Salem newspaper does a very good article on our donation of the remaining season tickets, and the donations of others. Link here

 

The Mariott is not as nice as the name (and the price) would suggest, but dude, there's a tatoo convention there this weekend I just recently read the thread on Husker ink, but would I be able to resist???? The place is a quite a show, with midget wrestling Saturday night and too many freaks, not enough carnivals. The lobby was worth the price of admission. I can just image how the local high school class of '67 reunion scheduled there at the same time probably flogged the organizer for not checking what ELSE was at that hotel on the same weekend

 

Anyway, walked about 4 blocks into downtown Greensboro Friday night, and was very impressed at the way this little town parties. Hot girls, VERY cute waitresses, good music, and the best damn cold beer I have had in a while. From what I later heard about W-S, this was definitely the place to be.

 

Up early to get my game face on with the help of about 10 cups of coffee and a pack of smokes. Unfortunately, as with every other morning, it doesn't help.... Another group from CRABS meets up with us and we head to the tailgating zone across the street from the stadium in the basketball arena parking lot. Loads of Husker tailgaters, and we have a great time, but can predict things to come as far as the weather. It's 10 A.M. and my clothes are soaked already.

 

If the tailgating parking lot was hot, we hadn't seen anything yet until we got into the stadium - which of course blocked any breeze that might have been brave enough to try to cool my rotund bod. Now we are from Maryland, so we do crabs. And the only RIGHT way to do crabs is to buy them live and put them in a steamer - live with a little water and Old Bay seasoning - and hold the lid on until they stop clawing to get out. Well, I now know how the crabs feel, except we didn't have the pleasure of being sprinkled with Old Bay. It was hot. Now that I've seen part of the recorded game, I have to laugh at their "mid-80s" forecast. They were about 10 degrees off. It was 95 degrees by the stadium thermometer, and that one was up off the field. And the sun beat down on our left side the whole game. My left leg could get humped by a lobster, it's so pretty red They said they ran out of water before half, but I saw two trucks packed to the gills with the stuff, so The ice was gone shortly after that. The lines at the concessions were unbeliveable, but the trailer toilets were air conditioned, so our "womenfolk" were taking loooong bathroom breaks. A Wake fan next to us said it all - "We weren't ready for this". He told us even NC State down the road doesn't bring this much red into their house. I guess all the "experts" at the LJS and elsewhere who questioned our level of attendance were way wrong.

 

Speaking of RED, we were somewhere between 1/3 and 1/2 of the stadium. How is THAT for fan loyalty? And what is cool is that you can hear it on the TV. The crowd noise for our offensive plays or defensive stops are as loud as Wake's fans for theirs. Our "Husker..... Power" was as loud as their "Wake.... Forest".

 

I'll leave the in-depth disection of the game to those of you who have been on here longer than I, but I have some simple observations. 1) We were fortunate to escape with a win and the Blackshirts did it for us; 2) Keller is NOT the savior gunslinger of the WCO we thought he would be; 3) Mo didn't light it up like we had hoped; and 4) Why the hell isn't Bowman's interception in the end zone in the 4th quarter one of ESPN's Pontiac Game Changing Performance nominees????

 

Another at-the-game observation that you may or may not have noticed on TV.... Keller was somewhat snubbed when he threw the TD at the end of the half and went to the endzone to get some love from his teammates. No one high-fived him or hugged him or anything. I started watching him on the sidelines and in the game after noticing that, and I'm not so sure that he's not kind of standoffish. Just reporting what I saw...

 

Saturday night was midget wrestling at the hotel, and some cold, red beer and great food out in town - air conditioning on, please!

 

Anyway, the Wake fans were great, no single digit salutes out the window from all the fans we passed, and the worst comment I heard all weekend was when I was getting ready to leave the hotel today and I saw an older guy with a WF hat on, and gave him a "good game". All he said was "We should have won". Hey, if that's the WORST thing you hear on an away game, you are in a good place.

 

All in all, it goes down in the books as another "quality" trip to an East Coast away game, just like Pitt a few years ago. NOT like Penn State!

 

And I'll be back in Blacksburg at the end of October to throw myself on the mercy of the court.....

[huskerdavo]

That is until we come to a complete stop just outside of W-S because of a car-b-que up ahead.

 

love it

 

Maybe they stayed away from Sam on the account he was having a crappy day I would

[Blackshirt]

Great story, thanks for sharing Greg!

[Foppa]

Well, despite the dizziness I experienced going back and forth reading the post , nice report. I hope you're way off on how our players are reacting to Keller...they need to be united, and I think they are. If I was completely unaware of how drop-happy our receivers were before this season, I'd start talking about mutiny...but this is to be expected, happily...no...unhappily...umm...whatever.

[Drowning_in_the_Sea_of_Red]

Great read.

 

And midget wrestling is always awesome.

[nepolo7]

I definetley stayed at the wrong hotel when I was out there

[seed60]

I definetley stayed at the wrong hotel when I was out there

 

 

 

We only ran into a couple of fans partying down. We still had a blast, despite the feeling of burning flesh

[maryland husker]

Sorry for the tough read. I'll have to figure out how to keep that from happening again. I usually post from this computer (work), and that was done from home on the laptop.

 

A phone call to the VA State Police confirmed the worst.... $5 for each MPH over the speed limit + $61 "processing fee". Hmmm.... $136 or drive down to try and keep my driving record clean? I'll have to ask about points and whether they "share" info with Maryland.

 

(BTW made the TV fan shots just after the commercial break with 7:47 left in the 1st quarter. If you look to the left of the cars.com box, just to the left of the Section 11 opening, you'll see me in my Barrett Ruud jersey (#38), the blond on my left (your right) is my gf, and a family of fellow CRABS is in the next 4 seats to my right. Funny thing is that I'm on the phone, but didn't get or send a call all during the game. I looked on my phone when I saw that and remembered that a friend of mine had called just before game time (11:55 local time) to wish us luck, and I could barely hear him because they were announcing starting lineups. And at the time of this commercial break, it was well after 12:30. I never knew that fan shots coming out of commercials weren't all live )

[maryland husker]

Pulled this from the "stats" page....

 

Kickoff time: 12:02 pm End of Game: 3:32 pm Total elapsed time: 3:30

Officials: Referee: Gerald Wright; Umpire: Tom Quick; Linesman: George Guzman;

Line judge: Tim Podraza; Back judge: Len Williams; Field judge: Scott Koch;

Side judge: Robert Cameron; Scorer: Scott Wortman;

Temperature: 80 Wind: W 6mph Weather: Sunny

 

[maryland husker]

Wow. Just finished watching the game, and can't believe how bad we played in the 4th. it was Wake's game to lose, and they did just that. Callahan's go for it decision could have been the top story on this board if we hadn't stopped them. Keller looks worse on TV than what we saw from the stands. He is NOT on my favorite list, and i would yank him in favor of Ganz - NOW. Don't let him start the USC game because of his poor performance. Same for TG.

 

At least that would throw off USC's game plan because I'm sure they've been licking their lips watching all of Keller's game film. Ganz would be an unknown quantity to them.

[Foppa]

So I should drop Sam from my top 8...hmmm...who can I replace him with...