ESPN College GameDay came to Ames for the first time ever for the 2019 Cy-Hawk Series, and it was nuts!
We arrived at the tailgating lots a bit after 8 a.m. (Lots opened at 5 a.m. that morning for 3:00 kickoff.) The wife and kids couldn’t make it to the game, so I didn’t bring the bus. That was probably a good thing, as the lots had opened so early that when we arrived, decent parking spots for mini buses were hard to come by.
We made our way down to Reiman Plaza south of Jack Trice, where GameDay was being filmed, by about 9 a.m. There were tons of people, the band was perched up on the balcony of the Sukup End Zone playing during commercial breaks, and the atmosphere was awesome. Reiman Plaza was tailor-made for hosting events like GameDay. I have to give props to Jamie Pollard and the athletic department for having this kind of foresight.
I’m too old to even have attempted lining up at 3:30 a.m. to get into the actual pit around the stage, so I had to settle for a position about halfway between Red Inflatable Stick Man (who assaulted me on my way past by the way, it’s cool) and the edge of the pit. From that position I took this nearly 360º panorama that still really can’t do it justice.
For the Cy-Hawk game I was sporting some new threads, my new “This is my tailgating shirt” from Raygun I found on sale at Hy-Vee, and my new red Cyclone Nikes I found at the outlet mall in Eagan. Forever True and a bargain to boot!
It was a good thing the kids weren’t there, as the game endured two rain delays that made the game go on for 6 hours. The kids would never have made it. During the first one I was stuck in my seats in the lower bowl, which was OK as I only had to endure some sputtering rain while lightning flashed off in the distance. I didn’t have a jacket or poncho because the weather had said it was supposed to be 82º and sunny!
We came back from the rain delay and immediately put a touchdown on the board and all was right with the world. Then the second rain delay hit, except it wasn’t even raining. It was about dinnertime so it seemed like a good time for a walking taco.
Then all hell broke loose.
I was already kind of back by the concessions area when they announced that hail was incoming. My friends and I camped out in the area underneath section E protected from the rain that was coming down in sheets…not Egyptian cotton sheets, I’m talking flannel sheets. Apparently I missed kids from the drenched student section sneaking onto the field and treating it like a gigantic slip-n-slide.
ISU students using Jack Trice as a giant Slip N Slide https://t.co/MZBy7qobjm
— SoundOFF (@SoundOFF13) September 14, 2019
Finally the rain stopped and there was sun.
I don’t think I’ve ever heard so many people singing The Beatles’ Here Comes The Sun. Then the sound booth started having fun playing some tunes, starting with Prince’s Purple Rain and The Weather Girls’ It’s Raining Men and I can’t remember what else. Between “rain” and “sun” you could probably keep a playlist going for a long time.
Finally we got back to football. Sure we lost some people, especially in the cheap seats, but tell me what other
Name me another fan base that would have a stadium THIS full after TWO weather delays?!….. I’ll wait! #IowaStateWay? pic.twitter.com/ueJw02H8GC
— Billy Fennelly (@BillyFennelly) September 15, 2019
…and then we couldn’t finish out the game and lost by 1. ?
But a lot more game play elements that were missing against UNI were present for this game against the Team Out East. A lot of fundamentals are going right, we just…didn’t finish.
In last 10 years in College Football, teams that gained 7.7 yards per play or more and allowed 4.3 yards per play or less were 498-2. Iowa State was one of those two losses on Saturday.
— Brent Blum (@brentblum) September 16, 2019
Sigh…
But I’m still on the hype train. The things we got wrong are things that are coachable and we can fix. We’ll get Iowa next year. Until then we still have a chance to win a whole bunch of games.
The bus will be back Saturday for the game against Louisiana Monroe.
GO CYCLONES!
Related: ESPN College Ames Day Schedule of Events | Birth of the Cy-Hawk
