WOFFORD HATE WEEK: Wait... Wofford Hate Week?

Like many of you I look at Wofford on the schedule and immediately let my gaze trend southward to the next game, the bumbling Rockettes of Toledo. I mean, honestly, why do I give two poops about the mighty Terriers? We are, after all, RAWRCATZ! And no amount of terriering will ever scare a RAWRCATZ! emissary. Especially in the friendly confines of Peden Stadium. However, my humility, which my mom has told me is a great quality, tells me that we must treat all opponents equally. Never mind that I've been ramping up for Buckeye Hate Week for months, Wofford comes first on our schedule, thus is the first step towards a MAC East crown. With this in mind, I tried to dig up some dirt on Wofford College, and draw a true opinion of Wofford from there.

For one, Wofford has a history, albeit a slight one, with football. Legendary Air Force Academy coach Fisher DeBerry is an alum. He was an assistant coach at Wofford for two years, before moving on to Appalachian State and finally Air Force.

Nope, Fisher DeBerry seems like a stand-up kind of guy. No reason to hate them yet.

Also, the owner of the Carolina Panthers, Jerry Richardson, played for Wofford and in the NFL before making some sound business decisions that allowed him to bring the NFL to his home state of North Carolina.

Again, no reason for hatred. So we move on.

Wofford College is considered an arboretum with its lush and natural plant life and is a member of the American Association of Botanical Gardens and Arboreta. There is nothing that RAWRCATZ! like more than wilderness. So I've got nothing so far.

Finally RAWRCATZRAWR! looked at Wofford's US News rankings and found... well some disturbing trends.

Average in state tuition for RAWRCATZ! U? $9,537
Average tuition for Wofford? $31,710

So these smug looking, snobby, East Coast dudes think that they are going to march into the Midwest and show us how to get dirty? Let me tell you something Wofford. RAWRCATZ! invented dirty. We eat, breathe and sleep dirty. You see a RAWRCATZ! who is not dirty, that means he just took a shower because he was covered in Terrier entrails. We will see you in the hollowed halls of Athens on Saturday you uppity punks, and you can bet that Rufus and a gang of 100 snarling RAWRCATZ! will be there to kick you all the way back to where the water is salty and where "men" own "yachts." You want class strife? RAWRCATZ! can bring the strife all damn day. Peden will be covered in your blood and the wind will pick up fractured puppy limbs for months to come.

RAWRCATZ! + 1: Michael Curtis

Over the weekend the RAWRCATZ! got even mightier with the addition of IN OL Michael Curtis. Curtis, who plies his trade in Mishawaka, becomes the 7th new prince of RAWRing for the 2011 class.

Curtis, who is currently unranked by Rivals and Scout, says that the RAWRCATZ! will start him out at tackle but will play both tackle and guard eventually. Hopefully once he gets on campus he will be turned into the mountain moving death merchant that RAWRCATZ! have come to expect out of their O-line.

RAWRCATZ vs Central Michigan

Bobcats are beautiful, noble creatures. They are one of the few big cats unique to North America, where they control a vast domain that stretches from Central Mexico to the upper reaches of British Columbia. And right in the middle of this, for a small stretch in the Appalachian foothills north of the Ohio River, these magnificent creatures hold court in Ohio.

Tonight, for the second time in 4 seasons, our Bobcats will play for the MAC title. This is truly one of the great turnarounds in college football history... I do not have to tell anyone who followed this team through the Brian Knorr era what a massive change Solich has brought to us. In some sense, this game is meaningless. If we lose, we go to our second bowl game in the past 40 years. Butch Jones will leave Central Michigan for some middling BCS school and we'll still be poised to contend in the MAC for years.

But, we cannot allow that feeling to prevail. Our RAWRCATZ have not tasted conference title glory in 41 years. Well before I, and I suspect most of you reading this, were born. Winning tonight would be an important step forward, not just for the team but for the program. I'm tired of going to Peden and seeing people clad in their Scarlet and Gray. There is no reason that we can't do what Cincinnati has done and throw off the shackles of being considered a second class program in our own fanbase. Solich is the man to bring us there, and a win tonight would greatly accelerate the process.

I'm not going to talk about "facts" or "stats" or "injuries". The truth is, they don't mean much. We come into tonight's game 13 point underdogs with two of our best players supposedly "questionable". We face off with a team with a dark horse Heisman candidate at quarterback and a coach who's currently the second hottest in the country, only slightly behind the man he succeeded at Central. None of that matters. We will win for the same reason we've won 9 of our games this season: We want it more. We need it. And we are not leaving Detroit empty handed.

Sorry, Central but you can get fucked.

Score prediction:

RAWRCATZ - 35
CHIPS - 27

RAWRCATZ versus The Ocean

The Ocean. It is big, it is menacing, it is salty. Since the RAWRCATZ don't have a game until Tuesday we will spend this Friday ruminating on a particular kind of foe.

The state of Ohio does not border an ocean. Sure, Lake Erie is big, but it barely even registers as a great lake. I'm not even going to capitalize "great lakes" because Lake Erie is kind of lame. It is no Ocean (see, caps), that's for sure.

So in lieu of an actual opponent this weekend, let's make one up. My pick - The Atlantic.



















Reasons for the Atlantic:

Geographically it is the closest ocean. It is also growing while the Pacific is shrinking, thus making it the dominant of our nation's coastal waters.

Travel expenses to the Indian Ocean would be astronomical, and we'd probably have to stay on a cruise ship or in some third world country. We already have to fight off Swine Flu, I wouldn't want the team to be exposed to typhoid fever and the bubonic plague of death as well.

Is the Arctic Ocean really an ocean at all? I just thought it was a mass of ice. Also, if you are going to travel a long distance, why go some place cold? That is why the NCAA lets you play 13 times if you go to Hawaii. Vacations rule.

The Pacific Ocean, as noted above, is the Atlantic's bitch. There's no need to play inferior talent. I mean we already played the LolHawks. One smiting is enough.

So now that we have settled on an opponent, it is important that we diagnose their strengths and weaknesses.

Strengths:

-Effing huge
-Has sharks
-Largest mountain range on the planet
-Contains salt

Weaknesses:

-Hurricane season largely over
-The Perfect Storm was filmed in it
-Not as much salt as Frank Solich
-Whales are gay

Prognosis:

The AO (acronyms BOOM!) will try and use its vast size advantage... to its advantage. Our smaller players will have to be shifty to avoid the pratfalls of becoming fodder for wave after wave of wave attacks. The salt is largely neutralized by Frank Solich, unless the AO is smart enough to construct a replica Solich out of sea salt. In which case all might be lost.

With the loss of their Hurricane offense their attack will be mostly neutralized, but their blanket defense, especially their d-line along the Mid-Atlantic Ridge will punish the RAWRCATZ and their ability to distribute the ball on quick strikes that negate the effects of the ridge will be paramount to our success. There is literally nothing we can do about the sharks. Sharks are fucking awesome.

Predicted Outcome:

If the RAWRCATZ want to win this battle of titanic forces (remember, the AO actually has the Titanic as well) they will need to be on their toes. This is a winnable game though. I have a feeling it will come down to a Matt Weller field goal, and that kid is Fort Knox Money.

Final Score: RAWRCATZ - 34 Atlantic Ocean - 32