The Driver’s Seat

Photo Attribution: Corie Brianne

I guess this is what the driver’s seat feels like? For years we’ve always been the petulant child relegated to the floorboard in the back of the station wagon, left to wrestle for a window view with the Clemsons and Pittsburghs of the world.

So yeah, you could say this feels pretty good. LSU definitely has the steering wheel (the thought of the Hatter with college football’s proverbial steering wheel in his meaty hands is as scary as it is hilarious), but we’ve got Google maps pulled up and we’re shouting out coordinates while everybody else looks on.

Yeah, 45 South and hang a left near Houston, it’s about 3 hours from there.

(I guess that means we’re in “the passenger’s seat” but somehow that doesn’t have the same ring…)

I think we were all at least peripherally aware that all of this was a possibility. We believed in it the way the Reds bought into Josh Hamilton after years of falling short and not meeting expectations. As if buying into the fantasy in our head was enough to sustain what was actually unfolding in real life.

Except now not it’s like OSU is having its HR Derby in Yankee Stadium moment and we all have no freaking idea how to act.

What do fans of teams in these situations do? Should we book hotel rooms in New Orleans? Should we even talk about anything beyond Iowa State? Should we go to Bedlam even though we’ve watched every other game in our living room in a faded Brian Montonati jersey t-shirt with a six-pack of Boulevard and our Twitter account set for “refresh every 30 seconds”?

I have no answers, I have no idea what we should do, how we should act. All I know is that the stage is set and the final scene is going to be something straight out of Red Sox nation, my question is what that scene will look like:

1.) Will it be Landry Jones doing Aaron Boone in ’03 and ripping our collective hearts out as OU not only takes Bedlam but leapfrogs Oregon and Bama to play in the BCS championship?

2.) Or will it be Brandon Weeden doing Curt Schilling and Johnny Damon in ’04 ending the drought and delivering the Big 12 crown to a bloodthirsty crowd on December 3rd as we send him to New York for a coronation of his own?

I think part of the excitement is that none of us has any inkling.

As Oklahoma State fans we have literally never been here before. I wrote a piece for the O’Colly today entitled “two more” that documents what that phrase has meant to different players and coaches over the history of our school. And what it means to us right now.

You should read it (give them the page views they deserve), but if you don’t (or can’t because of the paywall), this is how I ended it…

This year feels different, though. I know that’s what everyone from every corner of fandom always says. But this year feels like destiny, and it’s felt that way since Justin Blackmon scooted out the back of the endzone in College Station.

To play for the national title.