Big House Tailgating & Jagerbombs: November 2007

The battle for the Paul Bunyon Trophy - and State Bragging Rites!

'Tis that time of year again - time for the Battle of Michigan. It is Michigan vs. Michigan State. The game that divides many families in Michigan - including Bill's. He went to UM and his siblings went to State. This game also divides the media as well - some cover UM and the others...well you get the idea.
We got to sleep in this morning - up in East Lansing you can only start tailgating 6 hours prior to kick off. Hmmmm.....why is that? Oh yeah, they can't handle their alcohol in an adult-like fashion. You'll see why later in the post. We were in front of Ag Hall not too far from the stadium. It was a beautiful fall Saturday in Michigan and it would be even better if UM would win! This is the 100th meeting between the two schools with Michigan having won 2/3 of the games.
The other storyline of the day is that game day was Bill's 53rd I mean 35th birthday. =) Darn dyslexia! So we had cakes and pie for the birthday boy. The last time the two teams met on his birthday, Michigan won 49-3. Hope he wished for a UM victory as his birthday wish!
We had issues with setting up the satellite - it didn't want to work for us but finally Bill got it to work. Hallelujah!! It would have been very disappointing to have brought all this gear to not watch the game.
Reggie and I went to check out the Spartan band - they had a pretty cool pre-game march to the stadium. Then we went to see the Sparty Statue. See below for our pictures. If it wasn't a family event we would have done something a little different with the statue pics =)
The game didn't exactly go as we had planned - we were up 14-3 at the half and went down by 17 in the 4th quarter. But leave it to our senior QB to bring us from the brink back to the promised land - and a 6th victory in a row over our Spartan brethren. Our departing seniors have never lost to the Spartans. Good job guys!
Final score: 28-24.
In other football notes: Navy beat Notre Dame for the first time in 43 years and the number 2 team, Boston College lost to an unranked Florida state team. GOOO NAVY!!!!

Chris making the trip to East Lansin with us and hanging out with who else but The Captain

The State divided - its that time again, Michigan vs. Michigan St.

Getting our grill on

Bill FINALLY gets the satellite going! WOOHOO!!

The tables

Enjoying the view from the VIP section

Supporting a team that actually can beat Michigan - since the Spartans can't!

Hail to the Victors!

Tailgating with the Sparty fans

Hanging out at the tailgate

Sparty Stadium and crashing a tailgate

Yodle-eh-e-hoo! One of the worst outfits we saw in East Lansing

Reggie in front of our equipment semi - and a Sparty/App. St. fan

Don't get hurt!

Its nice that the Sparty fans can support App State - note I'm giving him a thumbs down

The blimp

Nate and Alex wait for the band

Spartan Bob leads the Michigan State band into Spartan Stadium

Displaying the Big 10 flags - Michigan and Michigan State out in front

The Drum Major

The band gets into the spirit

Posing with the Sparty Statue. Note that I am giving it the double bird!

The Sparty fans celebrate. Note how they are wrapped up in the Maize and Blue blankets! =)

Reggie doing what he does best - playing with the children. After all, he is a big kid!

This is why the Sparties aren't allowed to do a lot of pre-game tailgaing! This little Sparty fan has passed out in the bushes by Ag Hall. Wonder how he's feeling today?