1) You should definitely go. Penn State is an awesome experience.
2) We bought our tix through Iowa; I personally think that is the way to go.
This is the write-up I posted when we got back.
My Penn State Experience (long)
I really enjoyed reading some of other fans’ perspectives last week before I went out to Happy Valley so I thought I would share mine with everyone here.
We rented an RV in Des Moines with a couple guys here, picked up a few more in Iowa City, and a couple more in Chicago. After that we drove straight through to the stadium. I think we left Des Moines about 7 am central and arrived at University Park around 11 pm eastern. Long drive, but not bad especially if you have 7 guys rotating at driver.
Once we got to the campus, we drove around a little bit to check it out. The best part was driving past the stadium where students were camped out in “Paternovilleâ€. We shouted some “Go Hawks!†out the windows and of course had the Hawkeye magnets on the side of the RV which were met with equal parts “boo†and “F* you!†We drove through a nice old downtown area. Looked like it would be a good place to spend a couple hours if you had the time.
Next we headed out to the RV lot. Really nice setup here. Just a huge field with what seemed like 1000s of RVs. It’s 60 bucks a night to park there, but Saturday night is free; a pretty good deal, I think. Very organized as well. They directed us into a spot and everybody did a pretty good job of staying between their own lines. Once parked, we threw on some Iowa gear and walked around to check the place out.
I heard a lot of talk going into the weekend about what type of fans would be there, and I think it’s pretty ridiculous to generalize. Just like any fanbase, there were about 10% jerks and 90% nice people. We heard our fair share of lighthearted “boo’sâ€, “good luckâ€, and “F* Iowa!†One group of fired up Lion fans decided it was their duty to inform us that we were a bunch of f@gs, but then right afterwards we were “chased down “ by a couple other fans apologizing for their brethren. Obviously, we knew what we were getting into and weren’t taking anything to heart, but it was a classy move nonetheless.
We also ran into a couple of people who went out of their way to ask us about the trip and talk a little football. It was nice to hear their perspective on what cool things to watch for on game day. Of course, you have to walk cautiously when in someone else’s house which means you have to put up with hearing about how their back-up running back “ran a 4.18 40 in padsâ€. (Insert eye roll here.)
Exhausted by the long trip and planning to get up early to head over to College Game Day the next morning, a couple of us headed to bed around 12-1. A few of our other guys stayed up until 3-4 and through those thin RV walls, it sounded like plenty of Lion Nation were partying with them.
Saturday Morning – College Game Day. Two of us left the RV around 7 am to head over to the set of Game Day. Along the way we met a several lone Penn State fans who wished us luck and thanked us for making the trip. As we neared the stadium, we saw a few students just waking up in Paternoville. I could see they were sizing us up as we approached, so I offered a “good morning†which was met with a “Good morning, good luck to you guys.â€
As we walked up to the line to get into Game Day, we were met with some lighthearted boo’s. We also got the “@sshole†chant, which we would hear more than a few times that day. But, being pretty amiable guys, we made some “friends†and had a few nice conversations about the teams and the Big 10. Once again, being in someone else’s house, we had to endure some skewed perspectives such as how we cost them the national title last year, and how “Daryll Clark has a shot a the Heisman if he keeps playing well.†(Must… not… let eyes roll into back of head.)
After a little while, we decided to see if the lettering on our handmade sign was going to be big enough to see on TV. Knowing that the Lion fans were intending to “white out Game Dayâ€, we made our sign from neon yellow posterboard. On one side, we wrote:
Concussion.
Too Cold.
Bad Refs.
Next Excuse?
On the back, we went with the slightly more antagonizing:
We’re peeing on your whiteout.
Of course, holding the sign up in line got boo’s from both directions. Excellent. The text was big enough.
After a couple hours of waiting, they finally started letting people in. Total anarchy. The once single-file line turned into a group shoving match. Although we about halfway back in the line, we ended up going in the last third. Too bad Game Day or the school couldn’t have set up a more organized system. Still, there was plenty of room, so we were going to get in. Speaking of going in, they search you and check over your signs first. I don’t know if the security was the school’s or the show’s, but the guard seemed pretty delighted to take away my sign because of the “peeing†comment.
My response: “Are you serious?†I thought the message was pretty tame. I ended up talking him into letting me tear the backside off. And then it was into the crowd. Once again, because of the poor admission procedure, as well as the hold-up with the sign, we ended up about 10 rows back when we should have been about 5. No worries though, we were right in the middle and had a big sign.
The next couple hours was mostly fun. We would hold up our sign every time the camera came to the middle. The PSU fans attempted to hold up their white signs in front of us. We also got bombarded with plenty of Chick-fil-A stuffed cows they were handing out. I’m fine with that. It was all in good fun, and honestly, having your throws hit your intended target must be a problem for more than just Daryll Clark, because the PSU fans around us took the brunt of the attack. A less-than-classy move was when we got pelted by coins every now and then. The nice lady next to us apologized on their behalf, and we apologized to her that she was getting hit by standing next to us.
The best part of the whole time there: we discovered early on that Penn State has a cheer in which someone plays a cowbell rhythm and the students chime in with P………..S……….U. After a few times, I realized that there was a lot of dead space in the cheer, so I conferred with the Iowa fans around me and we decided that during the cowbell part, we would start chanting “Let’s go Hawks!â€. Needless to say, they were beyond flustered. Obviously, they had enough people to drown us out, but they couldn’t figure out if they should do that or continue with the cheer. By the 5th time, there were some VERY ANGRY fans. Awesome. Someone will have to let me know if you could hear us on TV. We were still outnumbered 100 to 1.
As we were leaving, we decided to hold up the sign again to remind them to come up with their excuse for this year, and one d-bag fan decided to spoil the otherwise good-natured ribbing by jumping up and stealing our sign to tear it up. Our response, “Wow dude. You are so awesome. You should update your facebook status to say ‘just tore up a sign’â€. He had no response. Once again, another Lion fan took the time to apologize on their behalf. All in all, a pretty good experience. For those wondering, I would say there were about 80% as many people as in IC a few years back, but a good-sized crowd nonetheless.
At this point, the rain started coming. We tried to make the best of it, grilling, playing bags, drinking some beers. The PSU fans next to us went out of their way to hang out with us. A good time was had by all.
A couple hours before kickoff a few of us decided to head over to The Creamery. Apparently, PSU has the largest university creamery in the nation. Definitely worth the walk. We ran into some good-natured fans there. A couple of fans mentioned they were from Jeremiah Hunter’s hometown, so we talked with them for awhile. The ice cream was delicious.
The Game. We headed into the stadium, and I was glad that there was a pretty sizeable Iowa crowd. My seats were 15 rows up in the corner, and it was pretty nice to be so close to the field. Didn’t look like there was a bad seat in the house…except maybe the upper deck. The crowd started getting pretty loud during the pre-game. I thought the Iowa fans did a respectable job cheering on our guys. Their fans were more similar to Wisconsin than Iowa in that they have quite a few organized cheers. They sing along to several songs played over the speakers or by the band. Very organized and loud, but IMHO, not quite as loud as I was expecting. They have 40,000 more fans than Kinnick so I was expecting it to be 50% louder. It was more like 20% louder. It must be similar to Michigan (I’ve never been) in that they have a shallower bowl in order to fit in all those fans. They did a pretty cool thing where the mascot comes in and stands in the middle of the field and has each section cheer, and then everybody cheers together.
My feeling from the Iowa team was they were never intimidated. I remember Iowa teams of past year, especially on the road, where it looked like they were sleep walking during warm-ups. This year’s team, at ISU and PSU was getting jacked up coming out on the field. Even when we gave up that first play, I wasn’t that worried. The team looked so composed. I could also tell early on that our offensive and defensive lines would have a chance to get it done. Even when we weren’t scoring early on, I could see the holes opening up on offense. I knew we’d have a shot later in the game. The defensive line, as you all know, played a fantastic game.
One thing I was surprised by, the crowd was really getting out of it as things weren’t going their way. Pretty soon, they were only getting loud on third down rather than first and second. Also, I couldn’t believe how many people started leaving early when they were only down by one score. The students, of course, stood strong and held out hope for the amazing comeback. The fans near the Iowa section were tame for the most part. Every once in awhile they would answer our “D-Fense†cheer with “Sucks!†Um, are you watching the same game? I decided early on that I was going to sing/scream the Imperial March on big defensive stops. Boy is my voice tired today as we got to sing it quite a bit.
At the end the players came over, and we got to give some high-fives and sing the fight song, and “In heaven there is no beer†with them. Heading out of the stadium, we got on our high horses a little bit with one of my buddies refusing to stop screaming “We are†as long as somebody would echo “IOWAâ€. On the way back to the RV lot I was amazed by what seemed like a miracle of physics: Where do you hide 110,000 fans? Honestly, it was like a ghost town. We hung outside the RV for awhile drinking some beers and firing up the grill again. Some nice PSU fans that we hung out with earlier congratulated us on the win as we crowded around their TV to catch up on scores.
I was planning a couple of choice comments for any of the Lion fans we had seen earlier that had given us an especially hard time, but never really got to say anything. We’d see 1 or 2 fans mope past every once in awhile, and I could tell they really didn’t need to hear anything more. Iowa had won the day. Bring on the Big 10.
