Having grown up in Michigan, the existence of Buckeye fans always felt like an urban legend. My classes in grade school were always pretty evenly divided between Michigan fans and MSU fans, but we were all united on one front: we hated OSU. That was a given. OSU was the bad guy, no questions asked. I had heard the horror stories about Buckeyes fans – like how they would key your car if you had a Michigan license plate or how they’d spit on you if you wore maize and blue to a sports bar. Buckeye fans seemed almost mythical, like the creepy dead girls that would haunt you if you didn’t forward that email in sixth grade.
I was definitely in for a culture shock when I put on my good ole Michigan t-shirt and headed down to Cincinnati for my summer job as a camp counselor. The first OSU fan I knowingly encountered was Matt, the camp director (imagine my shock when I realized I was working for a Buckeye). He jokingly said, “You’re going to have to change that shirt if you want to work here!” “What do you mean?” I thought, “When a girl wears a shirt repping the #1 public university in the country, you don’t just tell her to change.”
If he had been a MSU fan, I could have taken it – I knew how to deal with MSU fans. They always shut up eventually, out of fear that you’ll bring out one of the low blows, like, “Oh yeah, I guess your farming program’s better than ours.” But OSU fans, I’d come to realize, had no fear. I didn’t know how to hit Buckeyes where it hurt. How do you hurt a Buckeye? The Buckeye staff members just kept on telling me to change that darn shirt, and I didn’t know what to say to get them back except for something like, “Our stadium is bigger than your stadium” (which, apparently, isn’t as hard-hitting when it can be countered with, “We’ve beaten you in football the past four years”).
If I learned anything this summer, it’s that Buckeyes aren’t scared of us. They genuinely think of themselves as “warriors brave and bold” – nothing has ever made me so furious in my life. Nobody’s got it better than us, Wolverines – and they just don’t get it. I want them to see me in my Michigan hoodie and be embarrassed to be wearing OSU gear. (According to this completely candid pic of me sitting with a camper, I’m pretty intimidating.)
You know how at Michigan tailgates, we have that thing where one side says “Go” and the other says “Blue”? OSU fans have that same sort of thing, except one says “O-H” and the other says “I-O”. It’s kind of cute, except when my campers would randomly yell out “O-H”, thinking that I’d go against everything I believe in and respond. Ohio pride. What’s even the point of that? I just wanted to tell them about Michigan. About how Harbaugh was back, how we’d had our rebuilding year, how Michigan football was better than ever, and how OSU needed to watch out.
Football season would show my poor little campers which school really is the GOAT. It’s not like the state of Ohio was completely foreign to me – I’d been to Cedar Point and to Dayton for a couple of my brother’s soccer tournaments. Oh, and I went to the zoo in first grade (not the Harambe zoo, the other one). It was the concept of supporting the Buckeyes that was foreign to me – I wasn’t even sure if I knew how to communicate with OSU fans properly. Would they know what I meant if I said Ohio State, or would I have to refer to it as The Ohio State University?
“Alright, ladies! You need long pants to ride horses! No shorts!” I yelled to my cabin one day. My gaze fixed on one of my girls and, specifically, her pants. The girl’s big brown eyes looked up at me, “Is there something wrong, Miss Hannah?” I couldn’t stop staring at her grey sweatpants, which were embellished with a scarlet O. “It’s just, how close are you with whomever bought you those pants? Do they know that Michigan has won the most overall football games in the country? Do they know we have the largest living alumni network?” (This is possibly a slight exaggeration of my reaction, but, actually…not really.) Through gritted teeth, I told the camper her pants were fine, but I was really thinking, “I can’t wait till we destroy those Buckeyes in November.”
The rest of the summer continued accordingly, with me constantly trying to prove that it isn’t just any old rivalry. Michigan is objectively better, no question, but deep down, I knew that it was all going to come down to football. The only thing that got me through was the thought that in just a few short months, we will have defeated OSU. On the evening of November 26th, I’m either going to have to log into Facebook to see a bunch of Buckeyes “Feeling Excited,” or I’m going to be too busy celebrating to even think of checking Facebook.
There’s nothing I want more than to drive down to Cincinnati next summer with a W against OSU under our belts. Those Buckeyes, you guys, they really just don’t understand. They can’t comprehend the magnitude of the incredibility of the University of Michigan. So for their sake as much as ours – come on, guys. We’re the leaders and best. Let’s buck the f***eyes.
Photos courtesy Hannah Harshe, Giphy, Bleacher Report, SB Nation, Forbes