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If you're a fan of college football in the state of Utah, you saw something yesterday that was, in a word, shocking.
Shocking on many different levels.
To my BYU football friends, I must tell you, I know how you feel. And I know this because...
It's the way I felt time and time again when I attended classes at the University of Utah. I can't tell you how many times I watched as my team, the Utes, got their tails beat by a better team. Meanwhile, my BYU friends watched as their team, led by LaVell Edwards, beat up almost everyone they played. Now, I know it wasn't always like this.
It just felt that way.
Time and time again, BYU won their Saturday game; the Utes lost theirs. Because back in the late 1980s--early 1990s, BYU was a better team, better program, better players. That didn't make it easier to stomach, though. But as a Utah fan, I hung in there and over the past almost thirty years, things have changed. BYU's still a quality program, good players, good coaches, great fans.
But I wonder if Utah's is just plain better.
At least, maybe they are this year, or this past weekend. I recorded both games and watched them after I was done with Comic Con. That BYU game was so brutal to watch. And the fact that they lost to a team that Utah had previously beat only added salt to an already badly bleeding wound. Watching that game reminded me of all those weekends decades ago when things were different and I was the fan wishing my team was better and was winning all those games. The season's not over yet. An injury here, an interception there and the wheels can come off the Ute's program, but at least for today, I'm experiencing the ecstasy because I've known the agony.
* Photo taken without permission from the Instagram account of: @elishamataele
