Report from the Bleachers in the Rose Bowl

Report from the Bleacher Seats in the Rose Bowl

Since I was nine or 10, I have wanted to see a game at the Rose Bowl. Since then, I have been lucky enough to witness a lot of great sporting events, home-team-wins-championship events, in different venues. A game at the Rose Bowl was always on my To Do List.

The dream of attending a game at the Rose Bowl came not just from watching the Jan. 1 Rose Bowl game, but also watching the annual late-season game between USC and UCLA.

The cross-town rivals played at 4:40PM Eastern time, typically after other schools had finished their regular schedule, so that game was a showcase. The lush green of the playing field, the special sunlight when it was sunset where I lived, all made this more than just another game for me.

I was lucky enough to attend the recent game (Dec. 6) between USC and UCLA at the Rose Bowl and experience the game and stadium that had such an attraction for me for so long. This is a musing on that experience.

Some Rose Bowl History

The “Tournament of Roses East-West Game” as it was called then, started in 1902. It was then that Michigan beat Stanford 49-0. But that game didn’t go four quarters.

Stanford quit in the third quarter! Imagine how many ESPN specials would be devoted to that if it happened today. The game wasn’t played again until 1916, and seven years later, the Rose Bowl stadium was built to host that game. The building was built to resemble the Yale Bowl.

And therein is the reason that all the post-season games are called ‘bowl games’.

It was a natural to call this building the Rose Bowl. The Tournament of Roses was already being held in Pasadena for several decades to promote the area. “The Rose Bowl” is a natural name for the place: the topography of the area is like a bowl, and the Rose Bowl sits in the middle of that bowl. It's 77 rows around a green field, there are no bad seats.

The Orange Bowl started 10 years later, and the Sugar Bowl two years after that. Each adopted the "bowl" appellation to identify the new game as like the Rose Bowl.

Later bowl games, like the Gator Bowl or Fiesta Bowl, continued the use of "bowl" even though they aren’t played in "bowled" stadiums, nor is a "bowl" awarded. Now they are all "bowl" games, all legacy of the “Granddaddy of Them All.”

The Rose Bowl can claim some other firsts. The first radio coast-to-coast link-up was Jan. 1, 1927. And RCA distributors around the country invited their dealers to a special event at their respective offices on Jan. 1, 1954, when they debuted a mind-blowing technological first: the first coast-to-coast color telecast by NBC.

There are 77 rows of seats in the Rose Bowl; and they are all bleacher seats.

Getting to the Rose Bowl

The first clue you get that this is going to be something special is the notice on radio and in the newspapers prior to the game: The parking lots will open at dawn. Dawn!

There is a lot of public transportation to the game, but we drove and parked. Even though we arrived at the parking area at 11 AM for this 1:30 PM kick-off, it was clear that they must start parking at dawn.

There is a golf course immediately adjacent to the Rose Bowl that serves as the extended parking lot for the game. Even though we arrived around 11 AM, it was about 11:30 AM before we were parked, almost one mile from the Rose Bowl itself.

The spectacle begins right there on the golf course. Even eight-tenths of a mile away from the building, there are tailgating parties. And as you walk to the stadium, they become more elaborate. More than one-half mile away, you can see dense areas with small tents, barbeque, and tables. But this is no ordinary back-of-the-wagon tailgating.

The tents are not some generic green Costco tent, but a large shade tent in the school colors. The tables are set with tablecloths in school colors, tables for eight with fans seated in seats, which have the school colors.

Getting closer, the tailgating parties have DJs! The DJs are running their equipment from the same generators powering the wide-screen TVs, showing the earlier games that the partygoers are watching.

As you continue your way to the stadium, you have noticed that everyone is dressed in school regalia. Not just some inexpensive T-shirt that says ‘USC’ or ‘UCLA’, either. Fans are wearing handsome Stetsons, are wrapped in lush blankets, dress shirts, skirts, whole ensembles in school colors.

You still can’t see the Rose Bowl due to the trees lining the golf course when you encounter even more elaborate parties, with white picket fences and security checking your invitation.

Then you reach the ‘parking lots’ which have two-story tents hosting big buffets, or lining what appears to be the UCLA Mall, large tents each for dining, performing, doing radio programs, or shopping for UCLA gear.

Inside the Rose Bowl, Pre-Game

They take your ticket at a gate well outside the Rose Bowl itself, and you enter the apron around the stadium, a giant food court where you can watch the bands, mascots, and the cheerleaders enter the stadium.

The UCLA band did their famous high-step, and chanted something that ended in “O.J.” (He had been convicted just before the game). We entered the stadium via a ramp that overlooked the lower ramp where Traveler, the USC white horse mascot, emerged from his horse trailer.

Entering the seating area, I had the same feeling I would get each time I visited Yankee Stadium. The first glimpse of that very-green field against the grandeur of the giant bowl on a clear sunny day was a special moment. And even though there was an hour before kick-off, there was ongoing entertainment.

The Bands

The USC band and the UCLA band each fill the entire playing field, and each plays a routine before the game. The USC Trojan arrives on Traveler and prances along the south-side stands, in front of the section seating the students, band, and other USC fans.

The Trojan marches to the sideline at the 50-yard line, then proceeds to the center of the field and ceremoniously plunges his sword into the field. The USC fans, who have already been cheering since they arrived, go wild.

The UCLA band is also impressive, and they do their signature high-step march to the home crowd; the Rose Bowl has been the home field for UCLA for 27 years now, and between the back-end of the end zones the stands are entirely UCLA-colors.

From the time that the bands take the field for their pre-game performance until the end of the game, all the fans stand.

The Cheerleaders and the Cheers

Whatever the chance that there is actually intelligent life elsewhere in the universe, the chances are even slimmer that there are better-looking cheerleaders than the USC cheerleaders anywhere in the entire universe. That’s that.

We were in the south end zone, where all activity is USC. The USC cheerleaders are dancing and moving the entire game, constantly, and they must have 15 different routines that they execute flawlessly.

The USC fans know all the cheers and chants, and do them the entire game, while standing. They are intensely into the game like few fans anywhere.

Some of the cheers are universal, like rattling your car keys (“Start your bus, you have lost the game!”); some are obscure to me (“We want Gus!”…Dear USC fans: what does that one mean?), and some are funny.

The first time USC came up on a fourth-and-short-yardage, every USC fan started a particular chant. They held their arms out in front of them, and held their hands wide  open, as if they had grapefruit in each hand. Then they pumped their arms up and down alternating, and chanted, “Big balls Pete!” Hilarious!

The Game Itself

UCLA scored first when they recovered a fumble deep in USC territory, and called a trick play, a pass off a lateral pass to another receiver. It is a measure of UCLA offensive futility this season that that 21-yard play was the longest scoring play of the season. And to think they did it against the USC defense, which has to be seen to be believed.

One objective measure of the USC defense: the Charles-Woodson Michigan defense of the late '90s was a legendary college defensive unit. They gave up 3.7 yards per play. USC gives up 3.4 yards per play.

To UCLA’s credit, their defense pursued Sanchez and the running backs fiercely on every play, right p to the final gun. UCLA showed heart against this formidable USC team.

Note that USC has the best pass defense in college football this year. Who was second? UCLA. Consider that defense, and what Carroll intended to accomplish, when evaluating the box score of this 28-7 USC victory.

After the game Pete Carroll said, “We did what we had to do," and he was right. Even a 70-0 victory wouldn’t move him into the BCS championship game.

My BSC-related observation: There were 11 teams that averaged 40-plus points per game this year. Think about that statistic for a moment.

Done? Now, consider that FIVE of those 11 played in the Big-12. Anybody play defense there? If USC were in the Big-12, they could certainly average those same 40-plus points.

But no Big-12 teams would score 40 on them, or even 30. So don’t tell me about Texas and Texas Tech and Oklahoma. And don’t even mention the SEC. My advice is to give every Penn State fan you meet the 10 points and take their cash after the Rose Bowl.

When the game is over, the USC fans stay for a visit from the players. The players congregate in front of the band, cheerleaders, and fans and salute the fans. Several players go to the top of the band conductor’s ladder and address the fans.

Sanchez, who took a beating from the UCLA defense, got a big hand, and Ray Maualuga waved the Trojan’s sword, which had been planted in the Rose Bowl turf almost six hours earlier. Although most of the Rose Bowl was emptied by then, the entire south end was full of still-energized cheering USC fans.

It is not as if any one person can be credited with creating this kind of passionate loyalty. But Pete Carroll deserves some recognition for being some special kind of human. Now that 60 Minutes has shown yet another side of this terrific person, Pete Carroll should be getting that recognition from everyone.

Leaving the Rose Bowl

The pre- and post-game experience outside the Rose Bowl is a big credit to the security corps that directs traffic and fans all day at this incredible spectacle. Their day doesn’t end with the final gun.

Leaving the Rose Bowl there are long peaceful lines for the zillion buses which are cued up to ferry fans back to their parking spots about two-and-a-half miles away in Pasadena. Security manages this crowd with a nice manner. I watched for a while as stadium personnel patiently dealt with the crowd scattered over the acres of parking lot.

They float numbered balloons high in the air about every 100 yards, so you can get your bearings and search for your car (“There it is! Past that tree, and past that green!”).

Getting to the car was a cross-country trek over the same rolling fairways of the golf-course-parking-lot, only this time in the dark. But the dark was regularly punctuated by small bonfires, barbeques and glowing televisions powered by the SUVs or generators, as fans settled in to watch the late game while all the cars tried to leave. Smart people!

We were lucky to get out as soon as we did and we still didn’t leave for an hour and 45 minutes.

It was an amazing, thrilling, exhilarating day.