"When you can't be at Lane Stadium..."

Author: Mary Lane

Lacking Internet access and being surrounded by 20 family members in a hotel nestled in Virginia's Blue Ridge Mountains made it impossible to keep up with NFL news over Thanksgiving Break. It by no means kept football out of my life, though.

The Lane Family Reunion has been going on steadily for more than 20 years and the most trumped-up event, by far, is when we all gather together to watch the University of Virginia (UVA)-Virginia Tech rivalry game that always falls the Saturday after Thanksgiving.

The Friday prior, the aunts go out and buy mass quantities of crab cakes, baked chips, good wine and good beer. It's all beautifully arranged on a table in the back of the room and come game time my Aunt Lucy, a gourmet chef, dons some strange cooking gloves and begins to artfully hand-toss salad and dressing.

And yet, believe it or not, we're Hokie fans.

Preppy and Old South as we are, we hate pretension, and recognize that this heated rivalry in the Commonwealth stems more from socio-economic backgrounds than perhaps any other college rivalry. UVA produces many politicians and beautiful Stepford Wives, but Tech produces the scientists, farmers and engineers who build the bridges and feed the Wahoos.

The Lanes may drink Riesling on Thanksgiving, but we're just as happy to be out hunting and fishing, too. When we're lucky enough to be in Lane Stadium watching a game, we drink beer and go crazy with all the other Hokies. Wine and cheese at a tailgate is stupid. As ESPN's Colin Cowerhed put it, UVA football "is the softest bunch of cream-puff, bow-tie wearingÖwussies. There's not a softer bunch of cookie dough eating weenies than the UVA football program. Those guys wear makeup to games."

No matter how close you sit to our TV, it's impossible most of the time to actually hear the announcers, as several young urchins are inevitably running back and forth between the rooms creating varying amounts of chaos. The men and women are mixed between all the chairs and sofas squashed into the room, although the women tend to focus less on the game and more on the wine, and are the primary ones explaining to my grandmother, a Southern matriarch of graceful perfection, exactly what is going on.

My grandmother had a minor injury Thanksgiving night and was taken to the hospital, where her nurse was wearing a UVA shirt. "If you do anything to my mom or convert her to your team, I'll kill you," said Aunt Lucy. Too late, it seems, for my grandmother decided to keep things "lively" by rooting for UVA. It was only her charming comments in between cheering for them that kept our tempers down.

"Oh look, he scored a field post!"

"Oh well, that UVA boy has pork chops listed as his favorite food. That's quite nice."

Dispite such a plethora of distractions, the game was an exciting one, as Hokies coach Frank Beamer managed to implement his double quarterback technique and split time pretty much equally between Sean Glennon and Tyrod Taylor. RB Brandon Ore ran for 147 yards on 31 carries and a relatively close, exciting game ended with a great 33-21 win. "I'm back to being a Hokie now," my prodigal grandmother said. "Let's best keep the celebrating under control before dinner."

Oh. Yes, ma'am.