Lilia smiling

Got this last night after the win.

Watching the game together.

Great day to be a Cougar -BYU 14 OU 13

I was able to go to the game Saturday. I went with Mike, my friend in the ward. We drove down that morning and got to the stadium hours before kickoff. There were a few things to do like listen to the ESPN radio guys broadcast, spin a prize wheel for corporate sponsored junk and sweat profusely.

We lined up to go in the stadium about 3 hours before kickoff when they were going to start letting people inside. It was very refreshing when they first opened the doors and you could feel the cool breeze of Air Conditioning. $1.2 billion well spent, I say.

The inside of the stadium is even more impressive than the outside. The best word to describe it is huge. One thing I have heard a couple of times is that if you put the Statue of Liberty at midfield, the flame of her torch would not touch the roof. The big screen is amazing. 65 yards wide and 75 feet high. All in HD. $40 million well spent.

This was my first away BYU game (there is no way on earth this was a neutral field) and I have to say I was impressed with the OU fans. First of all, they outnumbered us like 6 or 7 to 1. We had probably 17,000 fans out of the 72,000 at the stadium. One thing that I think BYU fans need to learn from the OU crowd was how impressive they looked wearing the school colors. There was crimson everywhere. It absolutely kills me that the Bookstore sells BYU apparel in colors other than blue, white or even gray. When you go to home games at LES, you see people wearing these travesties and some people who aren't even wearing BYU apparel. It is hard enough when our school colors don't stand out the way they used to, but when people aren't even wearing the fairly common navy blue... Come on people. (side note: in looking for examples of BYU fans, I did come across this gem)

The OU fans were LOUD. There were a ton of them and we were in an enclosed arena. It was deafening. The BYU fans, especially the ones all sitting together had pretty good volume too, but 54,000 >>> 17,000. Even hours before the game started, when the players were trickling out onto the field for various pre-game warmups, the fans went nuts. They would get especially loud when the big screens would show Sam Bradford or Bob Stoops.

Our seats were right in the middle of OU fans. The people we sat by were nice and we ended up discussing the game before long. They were complimentary of our players. We did get a few adverse reactions from some OU fans (mostly BEFORE the game, mind you), but I was impressed with their fans overall. After the game I even got my first drunk-hug from a guy who was a few rows ahead of us. Nice guy. He slurred his approval of BYU winning the Title this year.

After the game on the walk back to the car, whenever we would see another group of BYU fans, we would just exchange smiles as if we were fellow members of the Ocean's 11 crew-we got away with robbery and almost couldn't believe it.

Let me tell you, the best sound in the world is silence. Especially after 3rd and 10 and BYU converts.

And 6 tries from within the 10-yard line and them only getting a field goal-sweet.

And my drunk-hug friend repeatedly yelling "BOOMER!" with no reply of "SOONER!" from those around him is one of the highlights for me.

We drove to the stadium from the hotel with Jeff and Tyler Nevens. On the freeway on the way back to to the hotel, flashing lights came up behind us. Jeff, being the courteous driver pulled over to the emergency lane (we were in the far right-hand lane). 2 police SUV's and 2 cruisers drive by us. Then Jeff sees a gap right behind the cruisers and pulls back into traffic. The bus that he (sort of) cut off honks at him, he honks back and speeds up. Then a motorcycle cop pulls right next to us and yells at us to "Pull your {yewt} over." Jeff pulls back over to the emergency lane and that bus that honked at us and 2 more just like it drive past us, followed by 2 more police cruisers with lights flashing. We almost cut off the OU football team's busses from their police escort. Perfect way to end the day.

Benny and I before I left. We were watching highlights from the 2006 and 2007 seasons.

Lilia ready for the game.

Faith took the boys to get some ice cream before the game. I love this face.

The outside of the stadium. That big square is a screen onto which they project the game.

Cops on Segways. Reminded me of G.O.B.

The big screen

The Pride of Oklahoma. Grandma would have loved it. They even have the sweet drum major. Very impressive.

A vertical picture to show the height of the stadium. That screen is 90 feet off the ground.

Scoreboard.

A video to show the size of the stadium and the amount of crimson.

The last play of the game.

With Mike after the game.

A view of the stadium from the lower concourse. Note the dejected OU fans.

The stadium at night.

Tailgate Bonus: What is wrong in this picture?

go cougs!

on saturday we had the great opportunity to attend our last home game for a while at lavell edwards stadium to watch our cougars play. it's been a great season for us. we've attended every home game this season. benny has attended every home game since he was born except for one - there was one game last year that i stayed home with him because of a fever he had. there were a couple of games this season where we left early - once because of inclement weather (it started snowing pretty badly as we were walking home) and once because it was the late tcu game and benny needed to get to bed. benny had a great time getting all decked out in his byu apparel. and it was so fun to see him really enjoy his time in the baby bjorn walking to the games with his dad.

saturday's game was a great one to end on because it was a sweet win over the utes. we were all thrilled to

see our cougars win it. it was fun to see benny too. it was such a different experience with him this year during the u game. last year he was only about 4 months old and he was screaming at the end of the game in my parents' family room because all of the cheering scared him. this year - at the stadium - he seemed to love all the cheering and got in a much better mood the happier all the cheering was. it's nice to see him love his cougars.

at the end of the game we had a great time rushing the field as a family. we were sitting in the south stands east of the goal post on the twelfth row. as the game ended spencer had benny in the baby bjorn and i followed with the diaper bag holding onto spencer's arm so we didn't get separated. as spencer was going over the bars, there was a middle-aged man who was helping people over who asked if spencer wanted him to hold benny. it was a very nice offer, but spencer was all set and geared up for rushing the field that he didn't miss a beat jumping down to the grass. i am glad to say that i was able to follow right over without falling at almost 7 months pregnant (about 30 weeks along). we ran to the middle of the field (it's a good thing i've been doing all this walking - i didn't even waddle!) and had a great time cheering with all those other cougar fans out there.
after we left we thought that we should have gotten a better picture of benny and his first time rushing the field, and it would have been nice to let him get down and walk on the grass, but we are really glad that we were able to share that experience as a family. it's one that i don't think we'll forget in a really long time.

GO COUGS!!!