One Point in Tucson, and Ken Finally Played the Record
Cleveland State25
Arizona24
- Game
- 2026 Week 10
- Date
- 2026-11-14
- Site
- Away
- Result
- Win
- Record
- 9-1
VIKINGS 25, ARIZONA 24. ONE POINT. FIVE FOR FIVE ON THE ROAD. NINE AND ONE.
Last year Arizona came into our house and beat us by three touchdowns, and I wrote that “sometimes the buzzsaw is from Tucson.” Well, friends, this year we went to Tucson and we were the buzzsaw. A small, nervous, one-point buzzsaw, but a buzzsaw.
I watched at Big Stan’s with the counter council, and in the final minutes it got so quiet you could hear the pickle barrel settle. When it was over, Big Stan came around the counter, picked me up off the ground (I weigh two hundred and some pounds, folks, and he lifted me like a bag of flour) and spun me around in front of the deli case. Chester stood up. Chester said, “Five road wins.” That’s two sentences in two years. Chester’s on a run.
Five straight road games, five straight wins. Lubbock, Oxford, Orlando, Salt Lake and Tucson. Write it down. Put it on a T-shirt. Put it on a sandwich.
Five pierogi. Home for the last two.
I played the record.
I came home after the game, took the big band album off the shelf where it had been watching me for a week, and put it on. Horns. Swing. The whole thing. I stood in my kitchen in Ohio City and didn’t dance, exactly, but something in my shoulders moved that I’m choosing not to describe.
One point. In Tucson. To finish a five-game road trip undefeated. I’ve spent a long time telling people that close wins are luck and road trips are traps. This team has now won close games on the road for three straight seasons. At some point the luck is the team.
Here’s my honest analysis: nine and one with Oklahoma State and Ohio left at home. Ohio is the one that matters. Tim Slocombe’s Bobcats are good again, Mickey’s daughter will be home for Thanksgiving, and the game is two days later. The Doom Model has assigned it a mood rather than a prediction. The mood is “tense.”
“Lil”: a radio call-in name. I called a sports show once in 2003 and the screener misheard me. I hung up. It followed me.
Back and forth
You played the record, Kenny!
I played it once. It’s not a habit. It’s an event.
Big Stan picked me up!
I saw. It was the most impressive lift of the season, and I’m including the offensive line.
Five for five on the road, one point in Tucson, a deli owner bench-pressing a columnist, and a big band record finally allowed to play.
Split Decision is fiction. Mickey Bridges, Ken Hogmanes and The Lakefront Ledger are invented; the games and scores are not.