Adam posted on October 23, 2012
This week, Gretchen, Isaac and I head to Tulsa to visit and introduce Ike to his family in that part of the country. It will be his first time on a plane, first time in the US, and first time to have to wear socks!
The other reason for us traveling to Okahoma this weekend is so that Gretchen and I can attend the big game - OU vs Notre Dame in Norman! Gretchen is a Notre Dame alum, and I am an OU alum, so we've had this date circled for years. We are both passionate about our school's teams, so it will be pretty tense watching them play each other. The game is made even bigger by the fact that both teams are doing so well, so the stakes are high!
Interestingly, this won't be the first time for us to attend an OU - ND game together. Both Gretchen and I were in the stands when OU played ND back in 1999, even though we wouldn't meet for another six years! More on that game, plus other OU-ND connections, below.
OU ND '99
The last time OU and Notre Dame played was at South Bend in 1999, my sophmore year. The Monday before the game was to take place, there was an article in the school paper announcing that an allotment of tickets were still available for the game, and they would go on sale the next morning at the stadium's ticket office. Hard to believe now that tickets were still available THE WEEK OF THE GAME. Also hard to believe we picked them up for face value, which I think was around $45, approximately a bajillion times cheaper than what I paid for tickets this year.
I called Brian that night, to see if he was interested, provided I could get some tickets. Of course he was. The next morning I got to the ticket office at about 7:30 AM to get in line in hopes of scoring some tickets, only to find about 20 other guys standing around outside the office. I'm sure we were all thinking the same thing: "Holy shit! There are only 20 of us here. We're all getting tickets!"
I cut class on Friday and my Dad, Brian and I headed north in a rented Buick LeSabre (or Century, can't remember), making the trip from Tulsa to Lansing, IL, where we stayed the night before the game. We made the trip in about 9 hours, only stopping once for a bathroom break.
The next day at the game, things started out well, with OU leading at halftime, before Jarious Jackson took over for Notre Dame and giving them the win.
We checked out the sights around campus, got out picture taken in front of Touchdown Jesus, and I figured that would be the last time I'd visit for a while. Little did I know, but MY FUTURE WIFE was also in the stands that day, and I would be back for many more games.
Other Interesting Items
- ESPN GameDay will be broadcast from Norman this weekend. The last time they were there was in 2008, for OU vs Texas Tech. That weekend, Gretchen and I had traveled from Mexico City to Chicago to attend a Notre Dame game earlier in the day.
- While I was at that ND game, I saw another fan wearing an OU hat and started talking football with him. He lived in Chicago, and the last OU game he had attended in Norman was when they played Cincinnati earlier in the year. I had gone to that game, too!
- The head coach of Cincinnati at the time was Brian Kelly -- now the head coach of Notre Dame.