The Heat is On

Another year, another opening week of college football, and everyone is hoping that this year will be the year for their team. They hope that they can compete for the big prize at the end of the year. Every year it’s the same thing, whether expectations are higher or lower than last year.

This is similar in every sport, but it seems that college football holds something universal. Fans sacrifice, suffer, and enjoy more than fans of most other sports.

For the city of Columbia, Mizzou, and all its fans the excitement has been building up to see how the uncertainties of the season would be answered and if hope for a championship was reasonable. However, when it came to the day itself, fans just looked to enjoy the day.

This would be difficult task for some, given the fact that the game was at 11 o’clock in the morning and that means getting up early for tailgating. On the other hand, that was the least of the worries for the rest.

Mother Nature decided that sweating proverbial bullets over the beginning of the season wasn’t enough, fans had to sweat the natural kind in over 90 degree heat all day.

Whether fans arrived early or late for the game, everyone had to endure a scorching heat that barely let a bead of sweat reach the surface before expiring it. Everyone had to find his or her own way to fight through the heat.

Some tried to drown it by downing bottle after bottle of water or your preferred beverage. There were enough hand fans to make a wind farm jealous, and yes there were poor souls who had nothing to subdue the heat they found themselves enduring.

Some simply baked in the oven that seconds as a football field known as Faurot Field. Unfortunately, not everyone got off unscathed.  One girl sitting in Mizzou’s student section tried to brave the heat, but fought a losing battle when she fainted in the second half or maybe a player waved to her.

Either way, many fans stopped waiving and bottles were put down. Fans who had been waiting months to see their team on the field had diverted concern to this girl. Fortunately, she did come to and her friends followed her to be cooled off. In the end, that will probably stick with those who witnessed it for the rest of this season, at least.

Sometimes things get to us. It could be a bad call, a bad season, or even the heat. But fans never let that stop them from hoping for the next game, for their team, or for their fellow fans.