DaveBarousse.com

I ran across an article today on Yahoo! Sports and got a good laugh. It surfaced due to the LSU vs. Ohio State National Championship Game earlier this week.

Link: http://sports.yahoo.com/ncaaf/news?slug=ap-bcs-contentiousgames&prov=ap&type=lgns

Here is a little background info on why I enjoy this story so much. Eric Andolsek became a relative of mine by a marriage between one of my family members and one of his family members. Growing up, he was always a hero of mine, even though he was the biggest person I had ever seen. Eric was also one of the nicest guys you’d ever meet (off the field).

If you read the story all the way through, you’ll see some of the more interesting stuff at the end. After the Andolsek/Spielman coin toss scuffle, they were both drafted by the Detroit Lions after college and became best friends and roommates. Their friendship ended with Spielman giving the eulogy at Eric’s funeral. Eric was only 25 years old when he died.

Congrats to the LSU Tigers, the 2007 National Champions! What a fun and exciting season.

I am writing this roughly three hours prior to kickoff of the 2008 BCS National Championship game and I can hardly stand it anymore. It’s time to get this game started!

Luckily for LSU fans, the game was previously scheduled to be played in New Orleans before the teams were selected. This means that the game is taking place about an hour away from my home town. Unfortunately for me, I am not currently down there and am not able to partake in the game festivities. I wish I was in New Orleans today eating some great food and “Tigerbaiting” some Ohio State fans.

The Dome is going to be rocking tonight and hopefully the Tigers will be leaving with a victory and another BCS National Championship. It should be a great game. Geaux Tigers!

Update:

My Mom and her husband were lucky enough to get tickets to the big game tonight, so they have been having a great weekend down in New Orleans. I got a call from her this morning saying that they were riding around the French Quarter in a fire truck that is sort of a mascot for my step father’s family’s Ford Dealership. Later in the day, I found some images of their crew that some random person took in New Orleans and posted on the internet. Looks like they are having a great time.

According to my mom (who has been to Mardi Gras in New Orleans a ton and many LSU games), New Orleans is CRAZY right now. Man, I wish I was down there!

Update:

30 minutes until pre-game starts! Game time is near.

Update:

One more commercial break before kick off. I’m about to explode! LSU won the coin toss and will kick off.

Update:

Start of the 4th quarter and LSU is winning 31-17. Only a few minutes left and my voice is almost gone.

Finally, Michigan hired Rich Rodriguez as their next football coach. This should ultimately put to rest all of the speculation that Les Miles will be leaving LSU for Michigan after the National Championship game in January. At least I thought it would.

Even prior to Kirk Herbstreit’s sources telling him that Miles to Michigan was a done deal, the Mad Hatter said several times that he was not interested in the Michigan job and would be staying at LSU. Of course, that doesn’t mean much these days with football coaches leaving in the middle of the night to take a new job without even meeting with their teams to let them know. So it really wouldn’t have been a surprise to me if Miles did leave after saying he was going to stay. And it’s not like we haven’t had that happen before. Recall when Nick Saban left for the Miami Dolphins hiding behind the distractions of Christmas Day to make his announcement in Orlando, FL (not even in Baton Rouge) that he was leaving LSU.

I do think that Miles may still go to Michigan one day because eventually he will want to go back home. And I can’t imagine that Rodriguez will stay planted longer than a few years once a better offer comes around and he realizes that the spread offense doesn’t work well with big slow quarterbacks. I just hope that I do not have to hear any more about Miles going to Michigan any time soon, especially any more before the National Championship game.

From now until after January 7, 2008 all I want to hear about Miles is how he is preparing to hold up the Crystal Ball at the end of the game in front of Tiger Nation. It should sit nicely next to the 2003 BCS National Championship trophy.