GAME DAY... Male Version

How a male views it... by my co-worker and childhood friend, Fredie Carmichael.

College football in the Deep South is something to behold. The anticipation. The excitement. The energy. The passion.
  
The season doesn’t simply begin in late August and end after Christmas. For most diehard guys the bowl game is followed closely by the recruiting season, spring practice, and the summer schedule breakdown period.
  
There is no lull; college football is not confined to a season here. But when the regular season does roll around, it’s not simply Game Day for us — it’s Game Week.
  
Almost as soon as the final horn sounds on Saturday we immediately begin breaking down our opponent for the following week.
  
By Monday afternoon, we’ve dissected every column, blog posting, tweet or video with analysis from the Sunday press conference. The week is full of obsessive message board reading, water-cooler chat, trash-talking text messages about our rivals and, eventually, predictions for the next game.
  
We’re pumped by the time Friday arrives. We wear golf shirts with our team’s logo emblazoned on our chest and we try to get through the day with as much productivity as possible. Some of us even put in extra hours early in the week so we can break away early on Friday to prepare. And once Friday night rolls around we try to temper our anticipation with a high school football game. But typically it just makes us all the more anxious about the next day’s game.
  
Before we go to sleep Friday night, we look over our plans for the tailgate and make sure everything is in order — tickets, tent, game day attire, grill, cooler and a football. We’re set.
  
Saturday mornings are usually hectic. We’re in a race to make sure we get to the stadium, set up our tailgate and have plenty of time — at least two hours — to sit with our friends and prepare for the game.
  
By the time we head to the stadium to settle in for the game, a nervous energy takes over. Seven days worth of hopes are now pinned on a group of 18, 19 and 20-something year olds. As the stadium roars for the opening kick off, we scream for our team and realize — this is what it’s all about.

Stay tuned... the Female Version is coming next!!  And a huge thanks to a wonderfully, amazing friend, Leilani Salter for taking the photo above at the MSU/LSU game a few weeks ago.