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Sports TwitterOHIO STATE VS. MICHIGAN
Zealous fans ready to cheer eight-loss UM, two-loss OSU
Friday, November 21, 2008
Following tradition, Nancy Dougherty's office held the annual pre-Michigan game celebration on Wednesday, Nov. 19. A co-worker's wife provided Buckeye candies — peanut butter balls dipped in chocolate — in support of the Ohio State football team.
Michigan-supporting co-workers caught wind of the gathering and countered. They wore maize and blue — Michigan colors.
"They even had their own cookies," said Dougherty, president of the Montgomery County chapter of the Ohio State Alumni Association.
This season's game between Ohio State and Michigan — annually one of the most anticipated dates on the sports calendar — isn't quite as sweet.
For the first time in three seasons, OSU doesn't enter the traditional end to the regular season with a chance to earn a spot in the college football national championship game. Michigan has it worse. The Wolverines, at 3-8, have already racked up the most losses in school history.
But based on apparel sales and ticket demand, fans from both schools are treating the pre-Thanksgiving grudge match with traditional enthusiasm, even if the seasons are somewhat deflated.
Michigan fans admit that a win against Ohio State would make their dreadful showing easier to swallow.
"For us, it's the biggest football game of the year," said C.T. Cesul, who heads the local Michigan alumni club. "For most of our Buckeye friends, it's the religious event of the year, so we treat it a little differently."
The football game between the two large state schools has become most notable in the past half-century. Not only is it a match-up of bordering states, but it often decides the Big Ten Conference championship. Some of the most colorful and talented characters in college football history have participated in it, and fans can discuss it as easily in February as in November.
This season's Michigan downturn (it is the first team to enter the game with a losing record since 1988) threatened to cool some of that passion, but at the Buckeye and Wolverine Shop locations in Sylvania and Perrysburg, retail outlets near the Ohio-Michigan border serving both schools, customer traffic has remained steady.
"But it's naturally not as important as it has been," said general manager Tim Kralovic, referencing the lack of a national championship contender. "The Michigan clearance rack is overflowing onto Ohio State's."
Ticket demand and prices remain high. On StubHub, a Web site that provides a forum for fans to buy and sell tickets, the average price for an Ohio State-Michigan ticket has hovered around $460 this week and has been the most sought-after college football game of the year.
"We're all a little surprised, really," said Sean Pate, a StubHub spokesman.
Passion remains. Last weekend, a group of about 40 from the area took a bus to watch Ohio State play Illinois in Champaign. After the Buckeyes' win, Dougherty and the other passengers were treated to a documentary on the bus screens about the rivalry's history.
The collective antennae went up.
"There was another video with last year's season highlights," Dougherty said. "We wanted the Michigan tape instead."
Contact this reporter at (937) 225-7389
or knagel@DaytonDailyNews.com
