If you had told me 10 years ago that I’d actually care about the 2010 Bedlam football game, the first words out of my mouth would have been, “What’s Bedlam?”
It’s true. I grew up in Waco, Texas — home of the Baylor Bears — and in that neck of the woods, football season isn’t something to get worked up over.
My dad is an Oklahoma native who graduated from Oklahoma State in 1975, and though he loves his alma mater, he touted academics over athletics. He never pushed OSU football on me.
I visited Stillwater and walked down Library Lawn before I even knew what Boomer Sooner meant. So you can imagine the culture shock when my family moved to Edmond in 2000, the last time the Sooners won the national championship.
At the height of OU football fanaticism, when every fair-weather Sooner sported crimson and cream and lived for Saturdays, the only college football chant I knew from this state was “Go Pokes!” I was overwhelmed and missed Texas, so I detested anything related to my new home, including OU.
I became determined to get myself back to Waco, become a Baylor Bear and reject the craziness that is the college football season. But seven years later, when it was time to choose a college, the University of Oklahoma was at the top of my list.
I moved to Norman in the fall of 2007, retaining my disdain for what I considered to be crazed football antics.
While other freshmen were updating their Facebook statuses about getting their season football tickets, I was busy looking up textbooks and plotting out the fastest routes to my classes. Football hardly affected my life until game-day traffic kept me from getting around Norman.
For my first two years at OU, I was content with my indifference to football.
A funny thing happened my junior year, though. While studying abroad, whenever I told other foreign exchange students from the U.S. that I went to OU, football was their first point of reference.
The biggest news from home in September 2009 was the Sooners’ loss to Brigham Young. Several BYU students who were part of my program loved rubbing the loss in my face, and I found myself disappointed about it.
College — to me — is all about academics. But could the Sooners’ athletic reputation actually say more about OU on national and even international levels?
Even more shocking to a self-professed apathetic football watcher was the fact that I found myself caring about OU football.
For my senior year, I decided to buy season tickets and even make the trek to Dallas for OU-Texas weekend.
I learned three things this season:
• First, I cannot handle tailgating. It’s for die-hard OU fans, and after 21 years of apathy, I just can’t deal.
• Second, OU-Texas weekend is an epic ordeal, and a Sooner victory made it oh-so-much sweeter.
• Third, it feels good to win Bedlam, something I wish my dad and brother — who’s an OSU freshman — could know the joy of.
From this experience — and with a little encouragement and education from participating in The Daily sports desk’s weekly Pick ‘Em competition — I now have an opinion on football.
I can actually distinguish between conferences, and yes, I know who DeMarco Murray is, his number and what he does out on the field.
I’ll admit, I’m nowhere near being a Sooner fanatic — that takes years of dedication. I recognize and truly appreciate the loyalty behind that level of fandom.
I still have quite a way to go familiarizing myself with the football roster. For instance, while doing some reporting duties on the South Oval, I took a photo of a random student who turned out to be Cameron Kenney, whom I later found out is a football player. Whoops.
So if a once entirely sports-apathetic OU student can change her ways and build up her Sooner spirit, then I’d say OU football really does have some magic to it.
— Reneé Selanders, journalism senior
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DancingTableLeg 1 year, 5 months ago
Very good column. I used to be very apathetic towards sports as well. After a couple months at OU, my own attitude is starting to change.