A Florida Gators Fan Spends the Weekend in Berkeley

Editor's note: This article was written in December 2007.

Written by Chris Canada, Gatorsfirst.com Co-Founder

I’ve been privileged to have grown up in the Southeast US, where people really understand football. They don’t just understand it, they live it.

It affects how the rest of the week is going to go. It’s something I miss being out here in California...

I moved out to the Bay Area in May on internship until December. Missing a football season at Florida may have been the worst decision I’ve ever made (this can be an entirely separate article, I digress…).

I’ve been to Palo Alto on many an occasion, to experience the nightlife of a “college town” and just to be around other people in my position (early twenties, college student, not a grown up, etc…).

One night I went to their main sports bar on the night of the Stanford/Oregon football game. After an Oregon nailbiter, the crowd came in droves to the bar.

To my amazement, the Oregon fans completely took over the bar and made it their designated fan hangout for the next three hours.

I had never seen anything like this in my life. A rival school coming into your hometown and dominating your home bar. It was disgusting.

However, I sat back and thought about it for a while, and I realized that Stanford hasn’t been a good team in years, and really never had a tradition-rich program, with the exception of John Elway.

So I decided to let it slide and enjoy my night. (The Oregon fans were great and had a lot of very cute blonde chicks. Not too shabby.)

Then, this weekend occurred: something that may change my life forever. This was my last weekend here in the Bay Area (two future weekends in FL for Thanksgiving and one in LA for S’s and G’s).

I have a fellow intern that goes to Cal for grad school and we had been talking about going up to Berkeley for a game all season, but it had never happened. However, USC was in town, so I figured this would be a great chance to see what college football out West was like.

We didn’t get tickets to the game, so we decided that we would watch the game at a bar in Berkeley. The game was at the same time as the FLA/USC game as well, so I figured I would just watch the Gator game on one of the 47 TVs in the bar. Naturally I was wearing my Tim Tebow jersey.

In the half mile walk from our parked car to campus, we passed many tailgaters. To my surprise, I was a hit. Three times I was stopped for someone to tell me how awesome Tebow is. The first guy had on a Florida hat and the He15man shirt on. I was floored.

The second guy was so happy I was wearing the jersey because he was Filipino and Tebow was born in Manila. The third guy walked by me and started furiously doing the Gator Chomp and saying that the Gators were the best.

This struck me as odd because Florida is 3,500 miles away and I was on the Cal campus on the BIGGEST GAMEDAY OF THE YEAR. I’m pretty sure that Tebow’s seed was planted in at least three girls on my journey to the bar.

We headed to the biggest Cal sports bar in town. This bar was actually pretty awesome. It was called the Bear’s Lair and was part of their student union. Imagine the Swamp Restaurant’s atmosphere at the Orange & Brew. It was pretty cool.

We got there a bit early, so we watched the Fighting Zooks take down No. 1 Ohio State. This was so nice to see. Zook has done a great job at Illinois and I always felt that he was given a raw deal at UF. Good luck to him (unless we play them in the Capital One Bowl or something!).

As game time approached, more and more fans were gathering at the bar. But once again, to my amazement, USC fans DOMINATED the Cal bar. What the hell? Are you serious?

We met some Vanderbilt alums and they asked me if I had ever seen anything like this. I answered with my Stanford story and told them I can’t really fathom what was going on. He then asked “Would this ever happen in Florida?” I responded with a quick no and told him there would be fights and riots in the streets of Gainesville. It was absurd.

In addition, I overheard a conversation about how the Pac-10 is easily the best conference in football. I wanted to chime in, but I really didn’t want to get my ass kicked. Granted, the Pac-10 is much better than they have been in the past 10 years, and they clearly stand out as the second best conference.

But the SEC currently has 10 bowl eligible teams and if Vandy wins one of their two remaining games, that will make 11 teams.

The Pac-10 currently has 5 bowl-eligible teams and at most can get 6, with another UCLA win. On a side note, UCLA lost to Notre Dame. Case closed.

During the game, the Cal fans were outnumbered 2 to 1. Let me reiterate the fact that this was the biggest Cal bar…on campus. There was a general malaise in the bar and it made me want to slit my wrists.

Luckily, I was watching Tim Tebow score seven TDs against South Carolina, which made my day better. Late in the fourth quarter, I made a trip back to the bathroom. I ran into two more Gator alums, one of whom went to my rival high school. What a small world.

On my trip back to the TV, some drunk fans started giving me crap for my jersey. It was at that time I heard, quite possibly, the dumbest thing in the history of sports. “Tim Tebow is nothing more than Eric Crouch.”

I instantly threw up a little in my mouth. I didn’t even have a response. I couldn’t rationally put together the words to combat that web of idiocy. After a Cal loss and a Gator win, we went home.

For my own sanity, I decided to look up the stats for Eric Crouch. During his Heisman trophy season, he completed 53.9% of his passes for 1572 yards. He had 7 TDs and 11 ints (Awful). He also rushed for 1,229 and 18 TDs (that’s pretty good).

Has anyone actually seen the numbers that Tim Tebow is putting up this year? Through 10 games, he has completed 67.8 percent of his passes for 2,532 yards. He has 23 TDs and 5 INTs.

He has also run for 718 yards and 19 TDs, (tied SEC rushing TD record). He has two home games left, and if the Gators make it to the SEC championship game, he’ll have four games left to pad his stats.

He is second in all of college football in passing efficiency, and his 19 rushing TDs are good for fourth in the country. He’s incredible. To compare him to Eric Crouch is a travesty.

All in all, I had a great weekend. I realized more than ever that SEC football dominates and that Pac-10 fans are retarded. I also found out one very important thing: the Gator Nation is EVERYWHERE!

Any thoughts?

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