Happy New Year to All

It is a little after midnight CST.  Usually I am long gone by now but with the excitement of the Illini in the Rose Bowl tomorrow, well I have pregame jitters.  I have maybe paid too much attention to the Illini on this blog this fall but as a long suffering fan of 40 years, well I hope those of you who are not a part of Illini Nation understand.  This comes from the heart for all college football fans everywhere; we here at RIVALSflag like each and every team out there.  As I gaze around my surroundings here, I look to my right and I see Archie Griffin and Woody Hayes.  I look on my desk and there is a Coke bottle with the LSU logo on it from the National Champs in 2003.  A card from Kirk Ferenz at Iowa lays on my desk.  A book about Bear Bryant, "I Ain't Never Been Nothing but a Winner" is on the bookshelf in front of me.  In a cup on my desk is my ticket from this year's Michigan/Oregon game; on a shelf is my Michigan RIVALSflag signed by Bo and Coach Carr.  Photos of our family at tailgates line the walls.  One has Dick Butkus holding our Iowa Hawkeye girl when she was 3 years old in the north end zone at Memorial Stadium in Champaign.  I guess what I am trying to say is that I love the college game.  It took a poor kid from Geneseo, Illinois to places that he never ever dreamed of seeing.  I have the hats my dad wore in the 70's to Illinois games all over this country.  I am indeed a lucky man to have played the game and it has been a part of me all these years.  Thanks to all those who have come by to visit the site.  It has been an honor and a pleasure to write about the game that I fell in love with 40 years ago in Kinnick Stadium at the University of Iowa.  We can only hope that the 2008 season has as much excitement as the season that we all just witnessed; from the App State win over Michigan, Stanford over USC, Arkansas over LSU to Illinois over Ohio State, it was truly a season for the ages...