Okay, so I am a Mountaineer fanatic! This is not something that is taken lightly or liked by many in the area of upstate NY I live in as we are less then 80 miles from Big East team Syracuse. I just could not put a real adjective in front of Syracuse this year.

As much as I love my Mountaineers, I have never professed the same love for the actual state of WV. I would like to go back and visit and will some day but I have never, until yesterday, wanted to live there.

I am safely ensconced in the recliner at my house, in front of what is termed the “big” tv as it is the largest one in the house. I have forewarned the kids that tonight’s dinner is leftovers and they are all more than capable of heating up their own as I am sitting down at 3:30-ish and watching WV and UConn. The game, of more significance than Coach Rod wants to let on, is being televised on ABC. For being in Syracuse territory, I have faired well this year in getting Mountaineer games on TV.

I am settled in with my Saranac winter sampler and a Winter Wassail whatever beer. I have some chips and dip. The game starts and I start acting like I am back in the student section. Only thing I am missing is my yellow – which I will find and wear before that bowl game. The broadcasters are being nice. They are talking National Championship – finally. They are also talking more about last night’s LSU loss and the upcoming Missouri-Kansas fiasco than the Mountaineers. No respect even when you are on the field.

The Mountaineers are up by a bit at half time so, rather than listen to more dripple about LSU and Missouri and Kansas, I turn to the Kentucky-Tennessee game. It goes into quadruple OT and I flip back and forth between it and the Mountaineers – watch the Vols and Wildcats when UConn has the ball. Suddenly, the fourth OT ends with a Vols victory and I go back to my Mountaineers full time.

I am watching and suddenly, as if the WVU-UConn game has no importance at all, ABC decides to go to the Georgia-Georgia Tech game. What is ESPN2 – where this game is suppose to be? The same flipping game! I am getting overridden for Georgia football that, because Tennessee took that game in four OTs, is useless also.

This just wouldn’t happen in WV. In WV, I would not be sitting in front of a TV that has Syracuse getting beat for the upteenth time, a TV that has Georgia-Georgia Tech on two channels. This is the northeast so at least I can understand the Syracuse game – winning or losing season. BUT – two teams from Georgia! Someone in sports programming needs to get a grip!