January 7 and January 9: Mixed Emotions

I wanted to get this finished on my birthday, but that didn't happen.  This is going to be long and rambling, so I apologize in advance, but I also think it will be one of my better blog posts.  The game was terrible, so I won't get into that too much, but here we go:

Let's start with January 9, 2005.  It was my 21st birthday and it was the day I moved into St. Ed's after transferring to Notre Dame.  The first person I met there was my roommate and fellow transfer, Kyle.  We were both a little unsure of what we were getting into when we saw our room in St. Ed's.  I was even more unsure when I came back to the dorm that night after a night of drinking and met another one of our roommates, Dan, and had one of the most bizarre conversations I've ever had with anybody in my entire life.  (By the way, Dan would later be kicked out of the dorm for sneaking six kegs in and by the next year, he thought my name was Pat.)  As it would turn out, transferring to Notre Dame was the best decision I've ever made in my life and that was the day it became a reality.

January 7, 2007 was the day I officially graduated from Notre Dame (although by then I had been done with college for almost a month).  Graduating from Notre Dame is my proudest accomplishment.  (I'm not sure what would be second on the list of accomplishments that I'm most proud of, but it might involve ping pong balls, my friend Vinny, and a long winning streak)  I had always gotten by in school without doing a ton of work, but I put in a really solid effort in college.  I think I found the right balance between doing well and having fun.

January 7, 2013 could have been the best day of my entire life, but it wasn't, and that's why I couldn't be too excited about this birthday.

I was in Miami in April.  Not once did the thought occur to me that I might be back in January to watch Notre Dame play for the National Championship.  It was also crappy weather in April.  This time it was beautiful.  My question:  Why aren't the Dolphins awesome?  What NFL free agent wouldn't want to go there?  We stayed at an apartment in Miami Beach.  It was Kyle, his wife Lauren, Jon, and me.  I never expected to like South Beach so much, but it was awesome.  The water was the bluest that I've ever seen.  We went out Sunday night and we met up with Wilhelm.  I hadn't seen him since I stayed with him for the Navy game in 2007 (probably the lowest point for Notre Dame football during my lifetime).  Before the game on Monday, we had lunch with Dennis and his girlfriend Courtney.  We had a meal at a bar/restaurant called Finnegan's Way.  I thought that was a good spot, but the fact that they were out of Guinness was a bad omen.  Kyle, Lauren, Jon, and I all wore Hawaiian leis in honor of Manti Te'o.  We took a bus to the game.  It took a really long time, but we got there around 5:40 and met up with Wilhelm and his family.  The atmosphere outside the stadium was amazing.  It was quite a party.  I only drank one Sam Adams because I wanted to be able to remember the game.  I was hoping to be drinking plenty of celebratory beers after the game.

Me and Kyle on South Beach

Dennis, Jon, Kyle, and me at Finnegan's Way for our pregame meal.

Before going into the stadium, we huddled in prayer.  It was one of my favorite moments of the day, but obviously, it didn't work.  Kyle, Lauren, Wilhelm, and I went into the stadium around 7:20.  We were all worried about having fake tickets until they scanned.  Everybody hugged it out before going our separate ways.  I was sitting with Jon's brother, Kevin.  We were closer to the Notre Dame bench, so I thought it would be a Notre Dame section, but it turned out to be an Alabama section.  I didn't have extensive interactions with Alabama fans, but they were very nice.  I didn't go to the Sugar Bowl in January 2007, but I know a lot of people had bad experiences with LSU fans.  I have nothing bad to say about Alabama fans, and they had cool accents.  They were also impressed with the performance of the Notre Dame band (more on that later).

Wilhelm, Jon, Kyle, and me outside Sun Life Stadium before the game.

As for the game, I hoped I would be crying tears of joy at the end (I absolutely would have cried).  I didn't cry tears of sadness (though I might have if we had lost a competitive game).  The closest I came to crying was when Kapron Lewis-Moore got hurt and had to be helped off the field.  I knew he was done.  It was his last game.  It was clear that he wasn't going to win it, but I hated to see one of our captains have his college career end with an injury like that.  And he would have had a shot in the NFL, but I don't know about that anymore.  I'm sure he'll do just fine for himself even if he doesn't get a chance to continue playing football, but it was really sad.

My view of the field, just before kickoff

If we had won, not only would it have been my best moment as a sports fan, it would have been the best moment of my life (if you think I'm exaggerating, you obviously don't know me well enough).  But the loss didn't come close to being the worst loss of my life (that was Game 7 in 2010 for the Celtics against the Lakers).  It wasn't even the worst Notre Dame loss I had ever experienced.  Last year, we lost five games.  Every Notre Dame loss makes me sad, but four of those losses made me angry also (Stanford was the exception).  This loss just made me sad.  Alabama was better, they played a really good game, and we played a really bad game.  I'd rather be just sad than sad and angry.  I got to a point where I just wanted the game to be over.  There was no way I was leaving before the game ended, but I wanted it to end.  The best part of the game was the band.  I texted Dennis (a former band member, who was in Miami, but not at the game) at halftime and told him that we were dominating the battle of the bands.  The band played the Back to the Future theme and made a Delorean.  Then they played God Bless America and made the shape of the USA.

The band in the shape of the United States.  I really should have taken a picture when they made the Delorean, but I was too upset.

As bad as we were, we could have been even worse.  LSU never crossed the 50 in the championship game against Alabama last year.  I was happy that Theo Riddick scored a touchdown.  I went from wanting him to play less to him being my favorite offensive player.  He'll be missed.

It was a terrible game, but it was a great year.  I got to see them play in Ireland.  I got to see them beat Michigan.  I wasn't there for the Stanford game, but that was awesome.  We beat Oklahoma on the road when nobody gave us a chance.  November 17 was a magical day that combined a great senior day with losses by Kansas State and Oregon to get us to number 1 for the first time since 1993 (although if one of those teams had won that day, maybe we would have beaten them in the National Championship Game instead of losing to Alabama).  On November 24, we won our first game as the number 1 ranked team since 1990 and beat our biggest rival to make it to the National Championship Game.  Manti Te'o made a great run for the Heisman.  The last game was a nightmare, but that doesn't change the fact that the regular season was a wonderful dream and I will always be thankful for that.  Thank you Brian Kelly, Manti Te'o, Louis Nix, Stephon Tuitt, Kapron Lewis-Moore, Zack Martin, Everrett Golson, Theo Riddick, Tyler Eiffert, Bob Diaco, Chuck Martin, and everybody else for everything this season.

We had said before the game that we'd go out after win or lose.  The game was so bad that I had no interest in going out.  Kyle, Lauren, and I went straight back to the apartment.  Kyle and I stayed up talking about the game for a while.  We had a six pack of Harp in the fridge and I drank four of those in an attempt to drink away my sorrows.  Kyle went to sleep and I stayed up drinking and reading stuff and watching the post-game press conference with Brian Kelly, Manti Te'o, Everrett Golson, Tyler Eifert, and Zeke Motta.  I got mad when I saw the AP poll had us fourth.  We earned a spot as one of the top 2 teams with our regular season performance.  If Oregon was so good, they would have been the team playing us, but they blew that opportunity against Stanford.  They won the bronze medal game and they should have been 3.  Ohio State would have been destroyed by Alabama also and their cheating prevented them from having a shot at playing in the National Championship Game.  We were being punished for having been good enough to play Alabama (just like Georgia was, they belonged in a BCS game over Florida, but because they beat Florida, they had to play Alabama in the SEC Championship Game).  Oregon also only won 11 games against FBS teams.  Alabama, Notre Dame, Ohio State, and Stanford were the only schools with 12 wins against FBS teams.  I finally decided it was time to go to sleep around 3:30 and my last thought was that I had to be up for work in 26 hours.  I was not happy about that.

I have one other note from the game.  On the left side of the jumbotron, they were scrolling through officials at both universities.  For us, they listed Brian Kelly first, then Father Jenkins, then Jack Swarbrick, and then some other people.  For Alabama, it was Saban first and then the president, athletic director, and some other people.  It should have gone president, athletic director, and then football coach.  Didn't we learn from Penn State that the football coach should not be the most powerful person at a university?  I realize that Kelly and Saban are the most important people at their universities, but the presidents and athletic directors need need to have more power.

Notre Dame just wasn't good enough this year, but if Kelly stays, I believe we will be back.  It's not as easy to win at Notre Dame as it is at a school that doesn't care about academics for their athletes (like Oklahoma with their shameful 47% graduation rate for football players).  I never want us to sacrifice our academic standards.  I am very proud that we are number 1 in student athlete graduation rate.  I would rather that we not be a championship contender than take a win at all costs approach like they do at so many big football schools.  But Brian Kelly has shown that we can be a championship contender and have high academic standards.  So I never want to hear that we can't win with our standards.  We just haven't had the right coach since Lou Holtz.  Now we have that coach so I hope he stays, but I don't know what's going on right now.

So that was my trip to Miami.  As terrible as the game was, I didn't regret going and spending all the money I spent for one second.  It was great seeing Jon, Kyle, Wilhelm, and Dennis.  I hadn't seen all those guys in the same day since 2006.  Hopefully we'll get another chance to see Notre Dame play for a National Championship.  If we do, I'll definitely try to go again.

My trip home wasn't fun.  My flight was delayed and even though I was first on standby for the flight before, I didn't get on that flight (the Jerry Seinfeld bit about flying standby came to mind).  I ended up getting home at about 12:20 on what was then January 9.  I really didn't want to go to work when I woke up at 6:30.  But my kids were pretty good.  They know I dress by mood.  I said before the game I would wear one of my Notre Dame ties no matter what happened.  I wore a black shirt with a black tie with the Notre Dame leprechaun logo on it.  One girl gave me a Notre Dame umbrella for my birthday and also brought in cookies that we shaped like a shamrock with blue frosting and a gold ND logo on them.  They were pretty awesome, but it was still a pretty sad birthday.  Hopefully next year will be better.

These would have been even more awesome if they were National Championship cookies.

There was one other good thing about my birthday.  Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Sammy Sosa, and all those other scumbags that made a mockery of the great game of baseball didn't get close to getting into the Hall of Fame.  Jack Morris absolutely belongs in the Hall of Fame.  Burt Blyleven is in the Hall of Fame, but he never had a five-year run like Morris had from 1983-1987.  Morris, John Smoltz, and Curt Schilling are probably the three best big game pitchers of my lifetime.  Schilling belongs in the Hall of Fame too, but he did pretend that baseball didn't have a steroid problem when he testified in Congress in 2005, so I feel less sorry for him.

So now I'll enjoy the rest of the NFL playoffs and start focusing on basketball.  I'll be at Madison Square Garden on Tuesday for Notre Dame-St. John's.  Soon enough it will be time to start planning some baseball trips again.  And that will get me to Notre Dame's opener against Temple on August 31.

Go Irish!