Go Wildcats!

While I don't really watch sport, one of the things I did want to do while I am here is go to a football game. And by football I mean American Football, not regular football - soccer in these parts. Part of my interest came from the fact that one of the #I2CFellow interns is on the Wildcats' team. Today was the kick off to the season which runs through the Fall, and I was lucky that it was a home game. Having managed to persuade my friend to join me today, I headed out this morning to get some purple to properly support my team. It was a good excuse to add a Northwestern shirt to join my Harvard tee (when I am back in St. Louis in a couple of weeks I fully intend to get a Cardinals shirt).

Ticket - check. Purple - check. Hat - check.

We headed out, on the free game day shuttle, to the stadium at Ryan Field - home of the Wildcats. On the way we passed a park full of people tailgating. Tailgating is when people come to the match with cars, SUV's and camper vans to have a pre-match cook-up/party with full size BBQ's and coolers full of food and beer next to their vehicles. I was told that it could be possible to take some food with me and ask if I could borrow someone's grill if I offered something in return. I don't lack confidence but I am definitely not bold enough to do that. Although I imagine it would probably not be a problem, especially with my accent - which is, no word of a lie, loved here. Maybe next time.

We wandered round inside the stadium and picked up some hot dogs since I had decided I was gonna go full out Americana today (hence the cap). Although I was gutted to find that the stadium was a dry stadium. The place was full of people of all ages mostly in purple Northwestern gear. There was a bunch of pre-match stuff going on. The players practising, the band and then finally everyone stood up while the National Anthem was sung just before kick-off. Here's some footage of the teams coming onto the pitch, accompanied by fireworks http://youtu.be/Bi8KwVtyPLQ

Wildcats v Bears (California) was not a conference match. A conference is, if I understood correctly, like a league in the sense that you don't have all colleges across the US competing against one another. Instead it is a specific group of colleges who compete. I don't know whether the top teams in each conference then play each other to see who is best. Today's match was a bit of a big deal since the Wildcats beat the Bears in last year's opening match. It was time for the Bears to even the score. Additionally this was also the first time the Wildcats had played an opening season match at home since 2009.

College football is massive here. College football is also big business, which contrasts massively to UK university sport. In the US those who are in the team usually receive a full or part scholarship for their education. In the 2012-13 seasons basketball and football generated $4.7 billion in revenue. Apart from the scholarships the players receive no part of that money and no compensation in case of injury, even if they are star athletes set to turn pro once they complete the obligatory three years at college that is required by the NFL. At the moment there is a battle going on to try and unionise college football players so they can receive benefits such as injury compensation. The point to this digression is that the Wildcats are not recognised as a particularly great team, probably because Northwestern expects them to actually graduate with decent grades in an appropriate amount of time, rather than just scrape by academically (i.e. studies rather than football practice is prioritised). However I was expecting them to do well against the Bears considering last year's opening game results. The other reason why college football is big business is due to the advertising. In almost every down time there was some form of stupid competition or advertising. Such as, "John Doe here is gonna try and throw four balls through the uprights in a minute so he can win a year's worth of chicken wings from the Great American Chicken Wing Company...cheer him on!" or some other such nonsense.

I was amazed at how many people there are on the team. Although there are only 11 players on the pitch, there are different units that play at any one time, depending on the state of play. There are offensive units, defense units and special units. Each have different player types and the players have different padding depending on which position they play. There must have been well over 50 players at the match. Unfortunately my friend didn't play - he would have if someone had been injured. The amount of time that is played is 60 minutes divided into four quarters of 15 minutes. The reality is that maybe 90 seconds of play happens at most before play stops for some reason (couldn't quite fathom out why it kept stopping). This meant that 60 minutes of play took nearly 4 hours to complete (mostly due to the advertising). By which time my butt was numb from sitting on the metal bench.

It was a lot of fun, although somewhat slow, which meant we could sit and chat as well. It took me almost the entire time to tune myself into being able to follow the game. After the first half, the Wildcats were getting creamed by the opposition. I think the first half ended 7-24. The funny looking scores are because of the three ways that a team can score: touchdown (6 points), points after conversion which is a drop-kick post-touchdown through the uprights (1 point) or a field goal which is a place- or drop-kick through the uprights without a touchdown (3 points). I think there are other ways of scoring but that was more than enough for me to get my head round. There were cheerleaders and a marching band. When the Wildcats finally woke up after the 1st half and started scoring there were fireworks let off with each touchdown and the cheerleaders would tumble (those are the tricks that we usually see on American college movies). I have a lot of respect for these players. They train extremely hard. My friend was training for several hours before a full working day at the office and then was training after work. These guys may look massive but they are extremely fast on their feet (that observation also comes from first hand experience with watching the Surrey men's Hockey team playing the Surrey American Football team at touch rugby. We got our asses handed to us). The crowd were pretty lively, much more civilised than any soccer crowd I've been part of. But it was fun to get up and shout with the rest of them. Sadly we lost, a respectable 21-31. It was a great way to spend an afternoon in the outdoors, with the sun on my back and feeling like I was experiencing a true part of American culture.