Today and  all week is officially I love college football week. Dedicated to the myriad of reasons that College football is superior to Professional. The NFL has the most fans, the most money, the best exposure, the biggest day of sports in all the world (Super Bowl Sunday) but in so many ways the NFL fails to capture the magic of the college game.

There are alot of reasons that the NFL never could be quite as special as NCAA football. Players are around for longer than 5 years, there aren't any walk-ons in pro ball, and there isn't the shared experience of college life that a student shares with the student athlete. The rivalry between the fans of pro teams is mostly lived by the fans, but anyone who has seen a  Michigan Ohio State or Oklahoma Texas game knows that its more than oa football game on the line.

Since this week is going to be somewhat boring, I have decided to illustrate some of my favorite facets of college athletics. More after the jump....

 

The Marching Band Is there anything more synonymous with college football than the band? (other than slush fund scandals, natch) Sure your  stadium might pipe in some lame ass 15 year old Guns 'n Roses music when your team scores a touchdown or 350 18 to 22 year olds in capes could play you off to an 87 year old ditty that can still make the toes tap.

It is in my experience that every single marching band is utterly convinced that they are the best in all the nation. While this may sound like a competition that falls somewhere behind world's fastest spaghetti eater in terms of cultural relevance, don't ever tell that to a band kid, they take that shit serious.You have got to hand it to the band nerd, they are as competitive and cut throat as the oldest and most cantankerous of old man fans. There is as much animosity towards another team and its band as anyone in the stadium, but with that certain band nerd flare of course.

via www.uofiwiki.org

Real live mascots.The men in cartoonish foam costumes are a given at both the college and pro levels. But only a place like LSU  could put a caged Bengal tiger into a stadium filled with tens of thousands of liquored up bayou folk. While a part of me wants Mike VI to break his rusty cage and go all Ziegfried and Roy on Les Miles, another more manly part appreciates the marbles it takes to bring a killing machine onto a football field. And yes by the way, they named the tiger "Mike".

The combination of Mother Nature and football creates the most absurd and awesome theater that the NFL can only imitate. Releasing an eagle into a stadium and having it land on the 50 yard line? Check. Live bulldogs that actually attack opposing team's players. You betcha. A real live long horn bull that can leave steamers on the sidelines? While the hell not? The live mascot is the greatest expression of the obsession that revolves around college football, an obsession that drives people to conquer nature for our own amusement. Colorado has a real buffalo (named Ralphie) Baylor has two bears,   Navy has a freakin goat! (named Bill the Goat) You may see it as some sort of exploitation, but PETA be damned my football team needs a live pig to lead us to victory.

Playing in front of huge numbers of people. Here is a fun fact. Memorial Stadium here at good old University of Illinois actually holds more people than Soldier Field  in Chicago. In fact most major BCS programs have a larger stadium than their in state NFL counterpart. The NFL has only one stadium that tops the 90,000 mark, major college football has 10, 5 of which top 100k! Mountaineer Field in West Virginia holds so many people  on Saturdays that its "population" is the largest in the state.

Why do college stadiums far out pace the pros in terms of capacity and attendance? Why have so many pro stadiums been rebuilt and renovated to hold fewer people than they once did? Its a little thing called the blackout rule. If an NFL team can't sell out its stadium, then its local  market cannot see the game on TV, robbing the franchise of huge amounts of money, Just ask the Detroit Lions if its easier to fill up 65k Ford Field, or 106k Michigan Stadium for an 0-16 season. NFL teams may have more eyes on them across America, but college players can wow more fans in person. 

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