Lee Johnson
Managing Editor
gljohnson@valdosta.edu

Sports Column

War Eagle! Gooooo  Dawgs! Sic ‘em! Rambilin’ Wreck from Georgia Tech and a hell of an engineer! All three can be heard on a fall Saturday anywhere on VSU’s campus. Purple and yellow, orange and blue and, yes, even the crimson and white of Alabama can be seen on a daily basis around campus, along with the red and black of VSU. Some see this as an epidemic: an evil T-Cell attacking the white blood cells of VSU’s circulatory system (forgive my analogy; it’s been five years since I was a biology major). My question to those who feel like the red and black should be the only colors seen on campus, no exceptions, is why? Why should we forget our roots, our original color of blood?
My answer is we should not. It is a part of who we are, how we were raised. SEC football in the South (and yes, the much weaker and constantly abused ACC) is life in this part of the country. Why should we give that up just because we go to a different school?  So do not get me wrong here, I love VSU and I love being a Blazer and I will be proud to don Valdosta State University on my diploma, but I refuse to give up my SEC heritage (War Eagle, by the way).
For many of us, VSU was a second choice, and most likely a fiscally practical one. It is a chance for people to get as far away as possible (Atlanta students) or try to stay connected to the life they have built here (Valdosta natives). This, in no way, is a bad thing, but more of an excellent opportunity to go to a good school without bending over backwards to squeeze into a campus that would swallow the weak. So keep that in mind when you see that, and I dare say it, Alabama fan walking down the pedestrian mall, and mutter under your breath, “If you wanted to go to Alabama, then why are you here?”
I’m not condoning skipping Blazer games to prop your feet up and stick your hand in a bag of Fritos while watching Florida lose to Auburn again, but I am saying DVRs are awesome! So if VSU has a 12:30 kick-off and UGA has a 1:30 kick-off, get up, throw on a VSU shirt over your UGA shirt, go to the game and then go back, press play and you’ll never know the difference (unless someone tells you, then you hit them with a two by four,  or whatever you deem appropriate).
So bottom line: stop complaining about this campus choosing a team from the SEC or ACC (just those two because if you like the Pac 10, Big 10 or Big 12, then, well,  God have mercy on your soul) over VSU. We are allowed to have two teams; it is in the rules – look it up. The more the merrier. Be a Renaissance man when it comes to sports, like them all, well except for Alabama, don’t like them.