College Football-less
Wednesday, October 21st, 2009Recently, fellow GT blogger Patty Vanikiotis wrote about going to see the Oregon State Beavers play the Stanford Cardinals. I commented about having some residual angst that my alma mater didn’t have a football team.
I graduated from DePaul University in downtown Chicago. I loved the downtown atmosphere. I got a job as an advertising representative where I learned a lot about the business world (and where I met GT’s publisher Fran Gallagher). However, I never felt like I was going through the college experience. DePaul didn’t have a football team. There were no big Saturday games in October and November to unite the student body. There were no pre-game, or post-game, parties.
We did have a basketball team, but they played about 30 minutes northwest of the school. Naturally, these games are not well attended by students. Nobody wants to trek that far through Chicago traffic and weather to see a basketball game (usually played by mediocre Blue Demons teams). Since graduation, I have attended more football games at my old high school (Mount Carmel) than basketball games at DePaul.
My final college choices were DePaul, Northwestern and Purdue. Northwestern and Purdue have football teams (although not always good ones) and basketball teams. Of course, except for athletes, nobody would pick a school based on it having a football team. After reviewing all options, I chose DePaul.
DePaul has improved dramatically since my departure. My nephew, Matt, is enjoying his third year on the new and improved campus in Lincoln Park. At least now he can enjoy some of the college experience of life on campus.
Still, now and in years to come, Matt and I will never have Saturday afternoon DePaul football games to watch or attend. The situation isn’t hopeless, though. My niece, Samantha, will be choosing her college soon. I keep pushing her to read Patty’s blogs. Maybe someday Patty and her husband will find Matt and me sitting next to them soaking up some college football fun for ourselves.
– John Wroblewski, distribution specialist
