Faces in the crowd…Actor and Texas Longhorn fan Matthew McConaughey was on the sideline for Saturday’s game with the Buckeyes. (Press Pros Feature Photos)
If you’re into people watching you can’t do better than an Ohio State football game. What you see, what you hear, and who you see is likely a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
Some, who have gotten that once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to witness an Ohio State football game in person, have called it a blessing.
A childhood friend from Chesapeake, who saw his first-and-only Ohio State game when they played Marshall last year, characterized the experience this way: “I saw colors, I heard sounds, and I saw people that I’ll probably never see again.”
Publisher Sonny Fulks writes OHSAA and Ohio State sports for Press Pros Magazine.com.
And that about describes it, regardless of whom the Buckeyes play – Marshall, or the University of Texas. If it isn’t a big game, they treat it all the same. They make it a BIG deal!
For one, every last second of an Ohio State game is filmed by their marketing people for use at some future opportunity to promote Ohio State, or people who want to be seen at Ohio State. Saturday, when it seemed that it was all of the above in jumbo-sized quantities, there were at least a hundred credentialed videographers going at full speed to record it all for posterity.
It’s been done so many times, already, but when the football team stands at the bottom of the ramp in the south end zone waiting to run out there’s always a crush of humanity that has to get one more photo of Ryan Day exhorting the crowd, the smoke, and the sprint through the flames and fireworks toward another win.
“How many times can you shoot the same video?” I asked a photographer with a Sony camera.
“I don’t know,” he answered. “They just tell us to shoot everything. Someone will find something different, I’m sure.”
And actually, they see to it that there’s something different with each week.
After 38 seasons Saturday marked the last appearance for 90-years-young Lee Corso on ESPN’s Gave Day show.
Saturday marked the final appearance on ESPN’s Game Day show for coaching and analyst icon Lee Corso, who at 90 years young announced this summer that the Texas-OSU game would be his final appearance. Exuberant and full of personality on screen, after he donned the Brutus head predicting an Ohio State win, Corso looked tired and uninterested after 38 years of “not so fast, my friend” and predictions as he slowly walked from the set to the east sideline where his entourage was waiting to escort him to a more private place to watch the game.
I’ve met Corso on two previous occasions and he really is the genuine article – gregarious, full of funny one-liners, and eager to please those who beseech him for autographs and photos.
The best Corso story I know is one he tells about coaching at Indiana and playing Ohio State in 1976. After taking a surprise 7-6 lead before halftime, Corso called a timeout and had his team assemble with the scoreboard in the background for a photo of the score. “It was the first time in 25 years that Indiana had lead Ohio State in a football game,” said Corso. “The photo of a lifetime.”
What I didn’t expect on Saturday was to find myself within arm’s reach of actor and Texas super fan, Matthew McConaughey, while he stood and talked with former Longhorn coach Mack Brown during pre-game warmups.
Knapke Kitchens and Baths, in Versailles, proudly sponsors the best area sports stories on Press Pros Magazine.com.
I’m not usually shy about being around people of note and celebrity. And in the early 90s when I was in Vegas attending a consumer electronics trade show I found myself on the floor of the Las Vegas Convention Center with Sean Connery. And if you like to people watch, Vegas is a hundred times more target-rich than a football Saturday in Columbus. Connery was there to make a promotional appearance for the Minox Company, which made the little ‘spy’ cameras you see in the movies. Connery was posing for pictures with photo retail dealers, and signing black and white photos of himself as Agent 007. At one point when he caught me watching him, he waved me over.
I handed him the black and white, and requested that he sign it…”Shaken, not stirred.” He broke up.
“Naturally,” he answered, in perfect character.
Matthew McConaughey appearing as Marshall football coach Jack Lengyel in the 2006 film ‘We Are Marshall’.
Saturday, when McConaughey finished his conversation with Brown, and had shaken hands with former Ohio State coach Jim Tressel, he turned to walk away and came face-to-face with me.
I knew exactly what to say.
“Matthew, I grew up outside Huntington (where they made the film We Are Marshall). I’ve watched it countless times. I have many friends and family that still live there, and I can tell you that it’s the greatest, and kindest, thing anyone has ever done for the people in Huntington and Marshall University. People love Matthew McConaughey in Huntington, West Virginia.”
My words took him by surprise, though he was obviously accustomed to recognition and addressing compliments.
“Really…you’re from Huntington?” he said, as a security person moved close to intervene. McConaughey looked at the security, and calmly shook his head that it wasn’t necessary.
“You know, I really love that film,” he smiled. “I enjoyed the people and the town. I’m happy to hear that they still like it. I didn’t expect to hear that today.”
He stuck out his hand, we shook, and he said, “Thank you. Are we doing a photo?”
“No,” I said. “I just wanted you to know.”
He nodded approvingly and walked away with his people.
Not even an “alright, alright, alright.”
The Arbogast family of dealerships proudly sponsors coverage of Ohio State football on Press Pros Magazine.com.