How exciting is tomorrow’s matchup between the Gamecocks and the Tigers? This exciting: Even I am caught up in it. Kinda. Sorta.

I am just about the last person you would ever call a football fan. Baseball, yes. Sometimes even basketball. But mostly, my interest in sports extends only to those that I can play, such as golf and tennis. And I have little interest in watching other people play those. If I watch a tennis match on television for five minutes, I want to turn off the tube and get out there myself. (Meaning that I’m either more of a doer than a watcher — which is doubtful, given my love for reading and watching movies — or I’m just a self-centered cuss.)

Anyway, I’ve been sufficiently caught up in the contact high of excitement about the Gamecocks — something that started about the time of the win over Tennessee, I believe — that I actually watched part of last week’s game on the tube. And enjoyed it.

More than that, I actually read one of the advance stories about tomorrow’s big game in the paper this past week. Not a people feature or anything like that, but this story about a real football-geek facet of the game, built around stats. I started reading just out of curiosity, wondering what a "red zone" was (and unlike many such stories, geared only to the cognoscenti, it actually told me, once I got to the jump page), and then got caught up in the fact that it seemed Steve Spurrier’s approach to football was much like my approach to life (or what I like to think is my approach to life): Never give up, and never settle. He doesn’t go for the field goal when there’s a chance for a touchdown. Neither would I. Of course, I would never punt, either — but then, I tend to take things to obsessive extremes.

So, having done the required reading and whipped myself into an appropriate state of anticipation, I’m all set for the big game. And if I had ESPN2 on my TV at home, I’d watch it. I really would.

But lacking that, I’ll have to settle for the radio. If it’s on the radio. I assume it will be.

Anyway: Go, ‘Cocks.

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