Congratulations, Curses, Jinxes, and Random MUsings
After beating the mythical shoe-wearing birds on Saturday in KC, our beloved Tigers are ranked #1 in the BCS Standings, the AP poll, and whatever the other poll is called that was supposed to accomplish something. Mizzou stands at #2 in the coaches’ poll. MU plays OU on Saturday in San Antonio, one of our favorite places in the world, for the right to play in the BCS National Championship game.
While I commonly predicted 14-0, told a few people in private asides that the game at OU was going to be tough but 13-1 might really happen, and am generally fairly optimistic about our chances (I tried to avoid saying “our”, “we”, etc., but simply can’t), the reality of being #1 in BCS standings and potential of playing in the national championship game simply hasn’t hit me. Oh well, lots of time between now and January 7!
Since the Tiger victory Saturday night, I have been genuinely amazed and surprised at the number of people who have told me “congratulations”. And meant it. I’m extremely happy we won. Thought of losing to KU in that context was especially difficult to stomach. But, I didn’t play. Didn’t coach. Etc. I sent lots of e-mails though and bought lots of tickets, so perhaps that’s why people feel the need to tell me congratulations and I can’t resist saying “we”.
On the lots of tickets topic, my obsession led me to purchase 81 tickets to MU football games thus far. 81. I’ll have used 12 personally, but still. That’s crazy. And doesn’t count the 380 tickets I put on the work credit card for company tailgate or the however many we end up with for the next game. I say again, if only there was some really obvious way that the athletic department and Sarah could get together so they’d get photos they need and we’d get tickets we evidently need.
Back to the KU game. Pre-game, the beakers once again proved to be liars with their athletic director making the ridiculous claim that the crowd would be 70% pro-KU. Wow. Wrong. However, sincere thanks to whomever in beakerville was responsible for keeping the red socks in the drawer this year. I’ll assume that was a nod towards respect and sanity.
Finally, many were expecting me to go crazy on KU week and send out large chunks of material (insert Mangino joke here) (insert Reesing with a piece of KC sod joke here). Home games only, for tailgating purposes, that is all. If I’d have been funnier during the year, I might have sent another one. As it was, I was sick of my ramblings.
Finally, No Freaking Cursing. Chase Daniel is on the cover of Sports Illustrated this week. Has caused me to read many e-mails of “oh no” and what not. Garbage. SI’s own research proves that any alleged curse has come true at most 37% of the time. Since the curse clearly worked on the shoebirds last week, my expert statistical reasoning allows that there’s only a 14% chance of it working two weeks in a row. And that’s if there was every any such thing. And there’s not.
BEAT OU!!!! And on a side note, screw ku.