I’m Thankful for Minnesota Football

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving and ate far too much turkey.

As we at OTE reflected on the things we were thankful for—for me, the hilarious photoshops of Kirk Ferentz and cranberry sauce (thanks BRT!), the cat gifs, the esoterica of college football—I realized that I had not yet taken full stock of what I was truly thankful for amid an oddball season of college football.

You see, I’m thankful for Minnesota football.

Photo by Hannah Foslien/Getty Images

Well, I say “Minnesota football.”

What I’m really thankful for is Minnesota football’s crippling ineptitude and fanbase apathy despite drawing on a state with only one Division 1 football program, approximately 9,000 graduates per year, and an entire metropolitan area seemingly clued in to at least the basics of “Row the Boat” and “fight the Nekton” and “How You Prepare Rusty Radishes”.

Why? Well, it allowed me to attend the Minnesota Golden Gophers vs. Northwestern Wildcats for free*, and all it cost me was my dignity and a night of intestinal distress.

Photo by Jamie Sabau/Getty Images

...that came out wrong. Let me elaborate.

You see, on the down-low this summer, the University of Minnesota’s ticket promotions office quietly advertised this gem (which WSR may or may not have alerted me to. Have I bitten the hand that feeds me throws Grain Belt cans at me?):

“NO WAY” was my first reaction.

NO WAY that in the aftermath of Michigan offering, and rescinding, tickets for buying Cokes, was Minnesota seriously offering two free tickets for some cheap-ish frozen pizza.

NO WAY that this would be to anything other than the Miami of Ohio non-conference game.

NO WAY. It was all three non-conference games, plus Northwestern.

The instructions were easy enough:

I figured I had a ten-cent coupon at Holiday anyways, and the nearest one was in the parking lot of the Crystal Cub Foods, so why not pop in, drop $12 on three pizzas, and save the wife a little shopping?

The next morning, I got the confirmation:

All I had to do was log into mygophersports.com or whatever the link was, give them that code, and choose from any of the non-conference games...or the November 17 showdown with my Northwestern Wildcats. If you can believe this, tickets were still available to all the games.

So two tickets it was, one for me and one for an out-of-town friend (the wife had to work).

So for all the slogans, anthracite jerseys, and creative chronological conjurings (I’m looking forward to Year One, Part Two in 2019), Minnesota football continues to do greater service to the entire community: They don’t just roll out a tarp or sell students a couple bottles of Coke—no, they feed an entire family of four drunk gathering at the MNW household.

And, in exchange, Gopher football allowed a Northwestern alumnus to watch the ‘Cats once again cut down the Gophers. And this time, on their dime.

And for that, I am thankful.