It’s amazing isn’t it? That in the history of the stadium, and all of the great match-ups that have taken place there, it took the last time we’ll see Nebraska until 2017 to set a new attendance record over the likes of TTUN, Texas and USC. I am sure homecoming and the fact that there were a lot of former players in attendance made the difference for this game between two of college football’s most storied programs peeked their interest.
I have always enjoyed the night games in Ohio Stadium and have always had a good time being there all day for them. I didn’t have to be in the stadium until 5:00pm this time and was bringing my son Philip with me so I took the opportunity to help out at the Driven Foundation tent.
While there I had the chance to hang out with and talk to Roy Hall and Maurice Clarett again. We had some awesome visitors on the day and met some wonderfully giving people who have become good friends of the foundation now. The future of Ohio State football’s backfield happened by in Ezekiel Elliot and he and Maurice gave me a great past and future photo op.
While we are on the subject of past Buckeyes, Stanley Jackson stopped by for a good while and it gave me a chance to get my wife a great gift in an autographed #8 jersey and to get a picture for her. Stanley is a great guy and spent a good part of the afternoon texting with my wife on my phone! He was recently appointed to the State Board of Education by the Governer and I wish him the best of luck in his new job.
Stanley was and is my wifes favorite QB to play in Scarlet and Gray and he really made her day. I hope she gets to meet him in person someday because he hasn’t aged a bit! It was great talking with Stanley about the system he played in and what a QB with his talents could do in Coach Meyer’s system. He mentioned he would really enjoy playing in the system that Braxton Miller has been handed and I agreed with him he would do well.
My son Philip tagged along with me for the day and got to hang around with these guys as well and took the opportunity to get a pic and talk about God and everything else with the guys. It was a nice day for him to remember for a long time.
Something that I have evidently missed during the first four home games in Ohio Stadium has been the neat formation TBDBITL has been doing during the Star Spangled Banner. The start out with a block formation of the American Flag with the Sousaphones in the area where the stars are. Then at about the middle of the song they move the formation and it makes it look as though it is waving, which is a really neat idea by the powers that be over the band. Great job guys!
I have attended a lot of games over the years since I started ushering in 1998 and I have to admit that I am not sure that I remember a game where the fans were so electric overall. The game definitely did not start out in a manner that would have kept the fans in it, but as I have been saying all year, this team has a switch and his name is Braxton Miller.
We have not been a good first quarter team this year and when the Cornhuskers started the way they did in spite of the pick six by Bradley Roby, I was a bit worried and the crowd was a bit quiet. That is until the switch was flipped and we went on a 42 to 14 run after being down 17 to 7!
Once that switch was flipped, there hasn’t ever been a larger or more menacing crowd in the history of Ohio Stadium. First I will take my hat off to the students that were in attendance because they were more relentless than the rest of us. They kept a cheering pace that rivals the offense’s pace at times. Very proud of what the Block O’s and the rest of the student body means to this team and the rest of us fans.
Next I want to applaud the Alumni who showed up in droves. There is a lot of excitement around this program right now even though all they can really do is go undefeated. That appears to be the most important thing to the players as they have mentioned it many times. The Alumni are the foundation of the Ohio State University and they represent the largest fan base in the world, for any team.
To say the least it was a great day and a great time under the lights watching Coach Meyer’s team put up 63 points on what many believed is the best team in the B1G. 106,120 fans agreed and definitely had a good time themselves.
Until Purdue in a couple weeks, have a great week everybody!
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