#TBT to an event that happened on a Thursday during this week of 2002. The best UofL football game I have ever attended (in fact, the only UofL football game I ever attended) had me sitting in the upper end-zone in the tailings of a hurricane on Sept. 26, 2002. But first let me complain about the disparity among the different UofL sports as pertains to being an honorary faculty coach. I was invited by sportswomen of my classes to serve as an honorary coach for women’s soccer, basketball and field hockey. What did I get for it? Apart from being introduced at half-time, squat. The faculty who are honorary coaches for men’s basketball and football? They get a swag bag of shirts, caps and other insignia-ed merchandise. Title IX still has some work to do to equalize the faculty opportunities to cash in from making nice to female athletes. Now, back to our story. In a Thursday-night nationally televised game, Louisville hosted the No. 4-ranked Florida State Seminoles at Papa Johns Cardinal Stadium. A driving rain left over from Hurricane Isidore, nearly 3.5 inches of which fell during the game itself, dominated the storyline. My nephew (whose visit was the reason for buying the tickets) and I were wearing long ponchos. Still, by halftime the downpour had soaked our exposed baseball cap bills to the point that they were wicking water through the caps under our poncho hoods, to the back of our necks, saturating our shirts, then the waistband, hips, thighs and finally calves of our jeans. The discomfort finally became unnoticeable. Once you’re completely wet, the laws of physics don’t allow you to get any wetter. In fact, the whole stadium became like a society that had somehow decided to live out its history under a waterfall. Only the crown of the playing surface was above water and both sidelines were flooded. The cheerleaders would run down the sidelines, and cast themselves on the ground to coast 25 yards alongside the grandstand in a Division 1 slip-and-slide. A man seated in front of us bought some nachos and cheese dip from the concession stand. By the time he reached his seat the nachos were so sodden they were like a melting Dali art installation and the cheese dip had puddled water standing in it. Undeterred, he wrapped a former nacho through his fingers, then plunged both fingers and wet chip into the cheese dip and happily licked the resulting cold, congealed goop from between his digits. However, there was still a game going on. Louisville was a disappointing 2-2 that season under Coach John L. Smith, whose son Nick sat in my Comm 347 class in the back north corner of the aesthetically awful Strickler 208. Florida State entered Papa John’s Stadium 4-0. At the end of the third quarter, Louisville trailed 20-13, but pulled to a 20-20 tie to force the game into overtime. In the first play of overtime, Louisville intercepted a Florida State pass. On the very next play, Louisville scored on a 25-yard run for a 26-20 sudden-death win. As you would expect, the crowd stormed the field, climbed and then shook loose the rain-slickened goal posts, although not before a number of university-property-destroying fans fell onto the heads of the people below them. It was a happy crowd on the late-night walk to campus through knee-deep water below the Eastern Parkway overpass. Next morning when I arrived on campus one of the yellow goalpost uprights was flung across the steps of the Ekstrom Library. I hear from a BigTN member that his former fraternity still retains one of the other three, left as a gift by its 2002 class of brothers (I will let that person chose to identify himself if he wishes). Below are inevitably rain-obscured photos of the event. The goal post mayhem photo is credited to BTNer Marvin Young.
Posted on: Thu, 25 Sep 2014 13:21:43 +0000