After the huge upset of Purdue over Ohio State yesterday I decided to pop down on campus to see a good friend of mine who lives down on Ohio State. Now needless to say I was wearing my maize and blue and for the first time nobody said a word. The depression was so great and massive that they barely gave my Michigan gear a second thought or glare. I walked up to my friend Haris's apartment door to see the lights were dim and the sound of ESPN Sportcentre could be heard. He answered and I walked inside with his friend's on the couch demoralized some even had watery eyes as their face's kept focus on the screen. He offered me a beer as I could see that most of them in the fridge were on the table with his buds so I declined and we both sat down.
He sighed for a moment then gave a faint smile and said "Alton, for the first time since I can remember I'm depressed. I mean really depressed." I gave a friendly pat on the shoulder and said "now you know how I felt that day back in 2007 on our first game of the season." He nodded and simply summed up yesterday's loss in one word. "Sucks." I nodded back and for that moment flashbacks of my reaction of the App St. game came rushing into my mind. I never had felt so depressed that day and that week. For us Michigan fans it was a moment of "I know exactly how they feel." Because we have been down this road many times. It was not until he said "sucks" that I realized how demoralizing this loss really was. I being a Michigan fan and knowing my team won almost forgot about the past seasons. But to this day games like App St. Oregon, Toledo and USC still linger in my mind and of course the consecutive OSU losses.
Point is it does suck to lose and upset losses hurt even worse. Were Michigan fans and we love it when OSU loses but we must also remember our place in infamy. We have lost more bigger games and upsets than OSU has of late so we must also keep our respect and past experiences into consideration. For Wings fans like me the pain of the 2009 Stanley Cup Finals still stings. Seeing the cup that has 11 of our championships on it raised on our home ice by the opposition? I never felt so depressed after that week. I guess the point is that we all feel the agony of defeat when it comes down our road and we all are hurt by it after it's damage has been done. For OSU fans this was their biggest upset loss in a long time so we can imagine what is going through their minds right now. I guess what I'm trying to say is no matter who it happens to or what team it happens to losing always never feels good.
Cool story brah...
I put up a tough front, but deep down I just want to be held.