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Happy Valentine’s Day from OTE!

Roses are red, violets are blue, this site would be nothing, if not for you.

Love > Hate. Thank you, Huskers.
Julia Nagy—Omaha World Herald

Happy Valentine’s Day, you guys! I know, in years past I’ve taken advantage of this holiday to gift you some amazing photoshop work, like last year’s Valentines and candy hearts or the year before that’s Valentines. (Note: Holy crap, these were good articles.) Last year also brought you some weirdly specific love notes from Rutgers, because they want very much to be loved.

This year, you get none of that. Sorry. I’m a busy gal. So this year it’s a crowd-sourced collection of Valentine’s Day poems. Some are about a “writer’s” own team, but mostly, they wrote about the team they secretly love totally hate.

The results, as you may guess, were mixed. But some years, you just kinda half-ass V-Day, amirite guys? Give a girl a pass, and enjoy these lyrical masterpieces.

Illinois

Roses are red,

Flowers all die.

It could be worse,

We could be Illini.

—WhiteSpeedReciever

Ok, maybe our Illinois writer will be more positive...

Roses are red, violets are blue

Illinois sucks and so do you

—Thumpasaurus

Roses are red

Blue jeans are pants

It’s been 5 years

Since we went to the Dance

—Still Thump

Roses are red

So is my pen

We’re never beating the Badgers again

—Yup

Roses are red

Yards measure distance

College sports suck

And so does existence

—Thump

Welp.

Indiana

Roses are red,

Violets are blue,

IU still sucks,

A fact which is true.

—Boilerman31

Roses are red,

Mudders can muck it,

Indiana you’ll never,

Get back the Bucket.

—Boilerman31

Iowa

Roses are red, daffodils are orange

God, Iowa’s defense it’s just super terrible and frustrating. How the hell did this happen? They only lost Peter Jok, who’s not a great defender. Blech. Poorange

—StewMonkey

Ok, so that wasn’t exactly Sonnet 18. But Stew has suffered a lot during Hawkeye basketball this year. Let’s check in with Creighton:

Roses are red

Violets are pretty

Iowa sucks at zone defense

And their guard play is shitty

—Creighton

Roses are red,

Violets are purple

Seriously, though, they’re a year older and brought in 2 capable freshmen, Luka Garza is a shoo-in for all-freshman team, but nope, by far the worst defense of any power conference school. Nurple.

—StewMonkey, who might be broken

Roses are red,

Flowers don’t have parents

You, too, can coach Iowa

If your name is Ferentz.

—StewMonkey’s application to the Iowa Writer’s Workshop

Fuck the flowers

Give me some money

It’ll make up for Stew

Not being funny

—MNW

Roses are red

But daisies are fine

Against Northwestern

Kirk’s just 8 and 9.

—MNW

Maryland

Roses are red,

Violets are blue,

The basketball team

May as well be turtle stew.

—BRT

Roses are red,

Violets are blue,

No one cared enough to write about Maryland

So this will have to do.

—BRT

Michigan

Roses are maize,

Violets are bluish,

Michigan playing defense?

Well now, that’s newish

—Noted Michigan fan G Filler

Violets are blue,

Roses are red,

Michigan won’t beat Ohio State again

Until after we’re all dead.

—WhiteSpeedReciever

Michigan State

Roses are red,

Holly is green,

Mark Dantonio is

The grumpiest man I’ve ever seen.

—BRT

Violets are blue,

Roses are red,

Good lord Izzo STOP

The Gophers are well and dead.

—BRT

Minnesota

Violets are blue,

Dead roses are brown.

It’s ‘bout time,

To put the Gopher program down.

—Noted Minnesota non-fan G Filler

Roses are red, and tend to rot,

PJ Fleck likes his dadgum chili hot

—StewMonkey

Flowers are nice

But they won’t fill the void

That Gopher fans feel

From these years without Floyd

—Creighton

Nebraska

Roses are red,

Violets are blue,

Nebrasketball is better than ten of your teams.

Who knew?

—Dead Read

Roses are red,

Violets are blue,

Looks FROST FROST FROST FROST FROST FROST FROST FROST FROST FROST FROST FROST FROST FROST FROST FROST FROST FROST

—BRT

Roses are red,

Growing them takes work,

Husker fans have been going

Scott Frost beserk

—BRT

Russ Rose is blue,

Another flower is an impatiens,

Suck it PSU,

Husker VB is the best in the nation

—BRT

Northwestern

Roses are red,

Violets are boss,

Well basketball sucks,

How ‘bout women’s lacrosse?

—MNW

The dog’s name is Spot

The crayon’s name is Harold

Is ten wins the ceiling

For poor Pat Fitzgerald

—MNW

Roses are red,

Carnations are cream,

Northwestern will always be,

Chicago’s Big Ten team

—Noted Chicago fan G Filler

Ohio State

Roses are red,

Buying flowers is a chore

Iowa beat Ohio state

55-24

—StewMonkey

This compressed schedule is shit,

NYC in March sucks,

Who would’ve thought,

We’d all be trailing the Bucks?

—Boilerman31

Penn State

Roses are red,

Violets are blue,

If you had to live in State College,

You would be too.

—BRT

Purdue

Roses are red,

Violets are blue,

Please make a Final Four...

Before I die, Purdue.

—Boilerman31

Pete Rose was a Red,

Joe Stalin was too,

Orville Redenbacher made popcorn

And went to Purdue

—babaoreally

Rutgers

Roses are red,

Violets are blue,

I wish the B1G could trade Rutgers

For literally any other U.

—BRT

Truthbombs, by Creighton:

Huskers have neckbeards

Wildcats have butlers

But whoever you hate

They’re still better than Rutgers

(Unless you hate Northwestern, right MNW?)

Wisconsin

Junkies need speed,

Smokers need lighters,

But OTE doesn’t

Need more badger writers

—MNW (love u, Beez and MC)

Violets are blue,

Bad things are red,

Hooray that wisconsin “basketball” is dead

—StewMonkey

Aw, the Bard of Iowa finally waxed poetic.

Roses are red, I love Ron Swanson

Because he’d surely say “f*ck wisconsin”

—StewMonkey

You know you want to write your own now—let’s see what you’ve got in the comments!

Happy Valentine’s Day!