Baby's First Football Game

On Saturday we took Silas to his first football game. And not just any game..."The Game," as it is known around here -- the annual Harvard-Yale game. Since we live a block away from the Yale Bowl, it was an easy walk. We almost made it through the whole game, but we had to miss the third quarter because we remembered the diaper bag but not the diapers...



We got some nice seats just close enough to see the action but far enough from any sneezing fans.

On the off chance that anyone's interested, here's how the game went down...

Yale dominated the first three quarters, completely shutting out Harvard.

These guys in the pink shorts helped get the crowd into the game, which was important since the only points scored for the first three quarters were in the first 10 minutes.

(Silas prefers Pac-10 action, so this game was a little slow for his taste.)


At halftime the bands from both schools mock the other in musical melodrama. In Harvard's sketch, president Faust is captured by an evil dragon named Elihu Yale from the wretched land of Connecticut and has to be rescued by John Harvard wielding his sword of truth. The dragon was "ugly as a Yale student with only slightly better breath."


Harvard finally scored at the beginning of the fourth quarter and was poised to score again here, but Yale held them.


Mysteriously, when up 10-7, Yale tried a risky punt fake that nearly worked but cost them the game. Harvard took over on downs in field-goal territory and scored a touchdown to take the lead. Then Yale moved the ball 32 yards on two downs with a minute to play and looked poised to recapture the game, but threw the game-clinching interception on the next play.

So sad...


Most of all, Silas loved the drama of it all.