What a spectacle it was! At 5.10am Greenwich meantime Ohio State became the first college football champions of the playoff era. It was an incredible game of football played by two teams of young men, many of whom surely have great futures ahead of them in the NFL.
One thing I admire most about big American sporting occasions is the way the whole event is staged. Event been the operative word too, as the organizers pulled out all the pre-game stops for this one. The highlight being the U.S. Military seen watching the game at their base in Kuwait.
Inaugural College Football Championship Game, An Event Worthy of the Hype
Leading up to the day, many wondered what sort of event it would be. Would it feel like The Stanley Cup, The World Series or dare I say it the Superbowl? Well, you bet it did with the obvious exception of a big half-time show! ESPN must take their share of the credit too with hours and hours of pre-game build up rather like we used to get in England for the FA Cup Final, or how things are done on SuperBowl Sunday. It just felt like an event you simply could not miss and it would be remiss of me not to mention the staging of the event by AT&T Stadium as well. Surely it has to become a regular home for this event?
ESPN spent hours building up to Monday’s game with some brilliantly entertaining tv. There was in depth interviews with both coaches, top players and some past greats of both universities. We also had a chance to hear from the slightly rowdy, but fun=loving fans who had travelled for the game and an odd lot they were too. For me the highlight of the entire build up was when the ESPN team decided to make fun of themselves.
One by one every member of the ESPN team of presenters took it in turn to read out the most insulting yet funny tweet they had recieved during the season. Lou Holtz( more of whom shortly ) got it really bad and poor Heather Cox? I will leave that to your own imagination. So to Lou Holtz. What a great man he is. What he doesn’t know about football hasn’t been written yet!
We didn’t see a lot of Coach Holtz on Monday but throughout the season the Saturday round-up has been un-missable due to him. When it comes to arguing his case, analysts did not dare disagree even though maybe he was not always accurate. He stated that Kenny Hill was a Heisman candidate. Kenny Hill, remember him? Oh dear Lou! The man though made the whole season so much more enjoyable for me.
Another ESPN highlight was the Monday show to predict the top four which didn’t always go to plan.. Although as time went on nobody could predict how the committee would vote with TCU and Baylor left scratching their heads constantly.
Having said that some praise should go to the playoff comittee. This was the first year of the new system and as already stated some decisions made you wonder at times. All fans really wanted however was the best two teams to be playing for the championship trophy. I really don’t think anybody can argue that’s exactly what we got and I for one cannot wait for next season already.
My final thought is that it was a magnificent sporting event and even the Superbowl now has something to live up to. We can only imagine the buzz it must have given those heroes over in Kuwait!
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