Your Stories: Tallahassee Road Trips
Nov. 11, 2011
CORAL GABLES, Fla. – Known for their loyalty to “The U,” Miami football fans far and wide will gather upon the Florida state capital for Saturday’s anticipated match-up between the `Canes and the `Noles. With over 80,000 expected to be in attendance for the game, HurricaneSports.com asked Hurricanes fans to submit their favorite memories from the drive into rival territory. Here are your stories:
Tracey Kulik (e-mail): “When I was a junior at Miami, I planned the Student Government road trip for undergrads to travel to Tallahassee for what became the first Wide Right game. We had 12 buses with 500 students and called the trip “The Canes Convoy to the Capital.” All of us were seated in the end zone together and when the final field goal attempt went wide right directly in front of us, we went insane. I’m pretty sure some of my friends still have pieces of the wooden bleachers that everyone tore apart in the celebration.”
Jon Reinfeldt (Facebook): “I’m from South Dakota and my father is from Wisconsin and we always make at least one trip to a Hurricanes game. Probably one of the greatest games that I have ever been to was the `09 game in Tallahassee. I was about 20 rows up on the same side where the pass fell incomplete. Thank you Hurricanes for the memory! I will never forget it!”
Ben Frantz (e-mail): “In 2007, I was 10 years old. I have had season tickets with my dad since I was 6. My dad decides to take me to my first away game so I feel how he felt back in the day when he would go to all the big games no matter what city. The game was amazing. We open up the game by scoring two touchdowns in the first minute. Then in the fourth quarter with a couple minutes left, there was a touchdown pass from Kirby Freeman , then less than a minute later, Colin McCarthy recovers a fumble. Ever since that game, my dad and I have gone to at least one away game every year. We are going back to our roots for another great game and a UM win. We will be wearing matching U ties for the game.”
Michael B. Meeker (Facebook): “Me, my brother, and two friends made the trip up to Tally in 2001. We left Miami at midnight and got there around 8:30am, I got a ticket for speeding on I-10 around dusk but it was well worth it, because we put it on them! And went on to win the national championship!”
Kenney Deweese (Facebook): “ýTwo games in mind when I think of Miami vs. FSU…One game was the 1997 47-0 loss we took on the chin, which let me know that we were not on the level and a new era was needed. The second game and the one I remember the most was the 2000 game; we beat them for the first time in six years and it was the arrival of a new dynasty. That game is called Wide Right III. No win was bigger than that one.”
Megan Mullane (e-mail): “My father and I have been to every Miami vs. FSU game since I was two, and this year is our 20th anniversary making the drive together. Our whole family will be there to watch what will surely be another epic rivalry. My father made me fall in love with Miami football and we’re from Jacksonville, the heart of FSU and Florida territory. I’ve sat through probation games in the Orange Bowl cheering even when Bobby Bowden was beating us 40-something to 0, and put his first string defense back in just so we couldn’t score. My first game in 1992 was the second “Wide Right” game. I was born the year we won a national championship, and I’ve loved this team before I knew it. Thanks to my amazing father, Jeff Mullane, I was able to go to both national championships since, attend as many games as we possibly can, and more importantly start a tradition of our own, something our family can pass down from generation to generation. I made a joke a couple days ago to him that I in another 30 years it will be our 50th anniversary and I’ll be wheeling him into the game, and he will probably still be sneaking a flask into the stadium and be just as rowdy as ever. GO CANES FOREVER AND ALWAYS!!!”
Christy Burchett (Facebook): “ý1991 Wide Right I sitting just behind the fateful uprights a s the kick sailed on by. I remember the whole game listening to that droning, incessant war chant – only to hear blessed and absolute silence as the entire stadium realized the Canes had emerged victorious. Ahhh….memories.”
