In a parking lot of a Sheetz somewhere between Cincinnati and Columbus a day after the Big Ten Championship, we’d pulled off to grab some food, get some gas and watch.
I will give you this: There is nothing remotely romantic about a Sheetz parking lot. Even as someone from Altoona, the birthplace of Pennsylvania’s superior gas station, it is hard to sit here and wax poetic about a parking lot.
Sheetz parking lots are not some grand place. There are in the lowest percentile of beautiful sights in this country – even if you’ll occasionally witness something interesting in one.
It’s a parking lot to a gas station for crying out loud.
There at Sheetz parking lot in Ohio in early December, Anna and I huddled over my phone, attached to a clip on the air vent.
Nearly eight years ago to the day, we’d pulled over with some friends at a Buffalo Wild Wings. (Look I was a lot younger then. My choices weren’t the best.)
After leaving Indianapolis on a new emotional high that only a sports team could give a then-22 year old, we were searching for another rush.
It was a hope and a prayer that Penn State – then Big Ten champions with two losses – would leap over Washington. Then again, it was a hope and a damn near miracle that got Penn State to Indianapolis, a victory over Wisconsin and me to that newfound feeling of hope.
One by one, the names Alabama, then Clemson and finally Ohio State flashed across the 900 or so televisions inside the outpost of America’s largest buffalo wing retailer.
For a moment, there was a glimmer – albeit a small glimmer – of hope dangling like a piece of chicken stuck between my teeth, right in front of us, offering promise that this rush we’d been pulsating from over the last 16 hours would carry on.
The purple and gold “W” flashed across the screen.
“Washington.”
Ever since then. Ever since 2016. You, me, my wife, my friends and your friends have been chasing that feeling we’d been saddled with since that moment.
“One day Penn State will get there,” you’ve thought every year since then.
In 2017, we’d watch all of it slip away — not once, but twice. First a lead vanished in the Horseshoe in what would have been a program-altering win for James Franklin and a program-altering loss for Ohio State. Then a week later, a rain delay and a game-clinching field in Spartan Stadium drove the spike through the coffin while simultaneously lowering and covering it.
In 2018 and 2019, we’d sow some of that hope once again – only for it to yield a spoiled crop once again.
Then there was 2020 and 2021 and whatever they were.
There was 2022, where yet another lead to Ohio State evaporated and with it any chance.
In 2023, the last shot at the four-team entry, it felt like Penn State could get there. It had the defense but its offense was the shortcoming. In the media circus of the Michigan week, it all slipped out of grasp again.
For those passionate about sports, in particular college football, I believe we mark our time as fans by what and how the team does.
For example, the weekend Penn State played Georgia State, you may remember it for a timeout James Franklin took to ice a kicker – up 56-0. I’ll remember that weekend because I didn’t want Anna to find the ring that was hidden in my backpack, which I was going to use to ask her to marry me the next day at the Arboretum.
Wisconsin 2021 wasn’t just a road trip to open the season, it was the first game we went to after COVID.
There are an ample number of stories that start off with the phrase “Penn State was playing” and end with “that weekend” among our friend group’s lore. Yours, too.
In most, if not all, of those stories, the game is an ancillary footnote to the story. It is rather a setting, almost never the plot.
But in a way, for Penn State (and I’d imagine other college football) fans, many who have a deep, emotional and real tie to the school, college football is a measuring stick in their life.
So much is built in and around Saturdays in the fall. So much is wrapped up – emotionally and even financially – that it’s too large to not be a pillar in my life or your life.
Even if you’re not the biggest fan, think about the times you’ve peeked at the score when you’re at a dreaded fall wedding. Think about how many times you’ve rushed home from your kid’s soccer practice in the morning to catch the kickoff. Think about how many times you’ve tweaked your life – even ever so slightly – for college football.
So that’s why I remember so vividly being in that Buffalo Wild Wings.
That’s why I remember so vividly being in that Sheetz parking lot. College football and more specifically, Penn State football, means a lot to me and it means a lot to a lot of other people, too.
And that’s why over the course of all of those seasons since 2016, the closest Penn State has been, we’ve all wanted one thing.
That’s why we stopped at that Sheetz. In Ohio. In December.
We were much more confident this time around that Penn State would be included as one by one once again, Rece Davis announced the schools. But there was still this nervousness lingering like my hunger. Yet my turkey sandwich with provolone, parmesan cheese, black olives, pickles and red onion would have to wait on my nerves just a few more seconds.
“Oregon”
“Georgia”
I have to imagine that as we sat near the entry of this Sheetz and as people walked by while we were watching, it was a bit odd. Inside the two-wheel drive CRV, the car and phone had turned into one of those 1950s-type pictures of an idyllic American family in a family room gathering around a giant tube television. Except our living room was our Honda. We had no children, only clumps of corgi and wiener dog hair in the backseat. And our TV was an iPhone 14, playing sound wirelessly through the car’s speakers.
“Boise State”
“Good,” Anna, always strongly opinionated about the college football world, seemed to interrupt Davis’s words.
“Arizona State”
“Texas”
Somewhere in the moments after the Longhorns logo flashed on the screen and the next name was said, I thought about that moment in the Buffalo Wild Wings. I thought about all of that time between now and then. The hope. The heartbreak. The good times. The bad losses. The painful seasons. The great memories. The friends and family and everything that makes college football what it truly is.
We’d been waiting for this.
“Penn State will be the number six seed.”
There were no more questions. There was no more wondering. My heart racing for no real reason could now slow down.
A few moments later, we’d learn the date and the opponent. SMU at Beaver Stadium on Dec. 21. Relief had finally arrived – even if the stress of college football’s highest stakes arrives in Happy Valley for the first time ever now this weekend.
It was in that relief as I was about to begin our journey back to Altoona and then Frederick after the Big Ten Championship, right before I’d put the car in reverse, that Anna grabbed my leg to get my attention with a large grin.
There, she exclaimed.
“Penn State is going to the College Football Playoff.”
vs 
Time: 12 p.m.
TV: TNT
Announcers: Mark Jones, Roddy Jones, Quint Kessenich
Radio: Penn State Sports Network
Announcers: Steve Jones, Jack Ham, Brian Tripp
