Today, I watched the California Golden Bears take on the Idaho State Bengals at the California Memorial Stadium in Berkeley, CA with my cousin TJ. This was his first ever college football game and my fourth overall after attending last year’s UCLA/Stanford Game with Justin.
The tickets were courtesy of my Uncle David Lambros, who’s part of the PAC 12 Officiating Crew, and interestingly enough, he was working that game, which made this experience extra exciting, even though we didn’t get a chance to see him in person.
Last time I went to a game at CAL, I sat near the end zone, when they played against Nevada. This time, we sat near the 10 yard line and we got really nice view.
The game itself was pretty interesting! Most of the first quarter was back and forth 3 and Outs, but CAL was ahead 28-3 at halftime. During the second half, Idaho State was trying to make a comeback for an upset win after a couple of pass-interference calls against CAL late in the fourth quarter. Also, one of CAL players was ejected from the game due to targeting, which is hitting a player with the crown of the helmet, just like I saw at the Stanford game last year.
In the end however, CAL was able to hang on and we won by a final score of 45-23. The biggest highlight of the game was an 89 yard kick off return for a touchdown. On the other side, my biggest highlight was waving to one of the officials on the field and he actually waved back at me!
Overall, this was one of the best college games I’ve seen so far this year, even though this wasn’t a PAC 12 match-up! However, it doesn’t matter whose playing the game or who wins. What matters most is being at the stadium in person and enjoying the whole experience!
As with my interest in college football, I’ve done several projects with this particular theme such as A House Divided, custom-made posters for conferences, combing all the teams onto one field, and more recently, I’ve done some with the actual stadiums they play in because where the game is played is just as important as the actual game itself.
As I continue to create these types of projects and continue to watch more college football games, who knows what I’ll discover next! Special thanks to Uncle Dave for the tickets and my cousin TJ for attending the game with me! Definitely look forward to the next game I attend!