Ok, so now that we have those initial thoughts out of the way, let’s take a look at the day as it went by.  I had heard reports of Tennessee fans in the local region, but had yet to see them.  I was a bit shocked when I got to the BART station in the morning and saw a lot of them buying tickets.  I helped a family buy some tickets, though I had half a mind to direct them to take transfer onto the Fremont train (which, for those not in the know, is the totally wrong direction).  But hey, they coulda seen Verlander outduel Haren!  So, I did my part as the nice guy.  I even later directed some Tennessee fans on how to get to the student store, because they wanted to buy a few souvenirs for the road. 

The scene on the streets in Berkeley was similar to USC when huge throngs of opposing fans roamed the streets.  Automobiled Tennessee fans would drive by pedestrian Tennessee fans and rev their engines et al.  They would walk in packs singing their fight song.  At one point, I went to Jupiter’s and it was lousy with them.  But the energy was good.  Unlike USC 05, I didn’t hate the Tennessee fans and so, I wasn’t quite as put off by the throngs.  I even chatted with a few about the AppState-Michigan game.  We were saying that no matter what at least the loser of Cal-Tenn wouldn’t have to endure the title of the most embarrassing loss of the day.  Way to be, AppState! 

 

"Of course, we’ll share our alcohol with you!" 

At about 3:30, we made our way up to the band concert on Sproul steps.  The place was packed.  Apparently, Cal had given Tennessee the Pauly Ballroom or something for their pep rally, because there were tons of Tenn fans up on that balcony overlooking Sproul.  The band ran up and began their performance.

 

  They sounded so very crisp and clear.  Really, that’s just the trumpets and percussion.  It’s not like you can hear the saxes or anything.  You could have the world’s greatest sax section, as I’d like to think we did from 1999-2003, and it wouldn’t really matter at all.  It’s all about the brass/percussion and then mostly the trumpets.  They played the Michael Jackson show, which is derivative of when they also played the Michael Jackson show at USC 01 (aka BEST.SHOW.EVER).  But I can’t help but feel as if people aren’t coming to this blog to read critiques of the marching band shows. 

There is a new Mic-Human Of Female Gender.  I wonder what Kate thinks of this.  If only we had known before we interviewed her.   The main dude, seen here rubbing his hands together as if he is plotting and/or scheming, was actually pretty good.

"Runnie Dub is mine!" 

Lotsa kwality cheering and yelling.  Hopefully, many Tennessee fans were there to see how we do it out in Californ-i-a.  After the band played, we headed up to the stadium.  I didn’t get a chance to go by the protestors, so I have no idea what was going on there.  I later heard they put a second fence up.  I also heard that one of the posts that holds up the California banner in the stadium broke and they couldn’t fix it, because it’d be a permanent alteration to the stadium, which is banned by the injunction.  How odd.  

I guess it was because of the fact they closed some of the gates, but I have never seen the entrace so crazy with humanity.

 

This photo is a little bit tougher to see, but the people were just massed all the way down to the street.  

 

On the way in, we ran into what I can only assume is Max Zheng.  Look at how tall he is!

 

We got into the stadium and settled into our seats.  They were fairly low down near the goalline.  So, at times, they were really amazing (i.e. if the play was near the goalline).  But if play started to move to the other goalline it was tough to see what was going on.  It also meant that we were close to the Tennessee fans and that their team was warming up right in front of us.  So, instead of getting some sweet pre-game shots of our Golden Bears warming up, I got some sweet pre-game shots of random people I don’t know anything about warming up.  To wit:

 

 

 

There’s our boys! But come closer!

 

They have a whole new opening to the game.  They did individual introductions for each starter with the starter doing a little something or other in a video clip.  For example, here is Syd Quan going dumb.  He went quite dumb, I must admit.  And with his giant mop of dreads, it was actually pretty cool.

 

For cereal, Syd Quan must be the happiest camper EVAIR right now.  He was the poster child for the loss last year and had the most reason out of anybody to want vengeance.  To want victory.  He played a great game and helped us get that victory.  As I said the other day, although he might not have agreed with this sentiment on the night of 9.2.06, he’ll be a much better player because of last year’s game.  From humiliation stems the desire to never feel that again.  Syd Quan is one of my favorite players and I hope he went very dumb last night after the game.    

Then, the band did pre-game.  Went really well for the first game.  Most importantly, I started to feel we had a chance to win, because the drum major caught the baton.  After the band runs onto the field, the drum major marches out in front of them and then throws their baton up in the air.  Superstition has it that if they catch it, Cal will win.  And if they drop it, Cal will lose.  

Here he is, catching it:

Then, there was the flyover:

 

And then the team ran out.

 

 

Even though we were on the far extreme side of the field from North Tunnel, some of the players ran all the way over to the Tennessee side.  That player Young with the super long dreds came screaming out of nowhere shaking his dreds everywhere.  I wonder what effect that had on the Tennessee fans. 

 

You can see him in the front there.  In the next post, I’ll post some photos from the game.  From our vantage point in the first half, we were looking straight down the sun.  It looked like this:

 

So, it was a bit tough to see at times, esp. on the far side of the field.  But we were right there, in the thick of it.  Great times, great times.