One Point. Ohio. Two Days After Thanksgiving.
Cleveland State42
Ohio43
- Game
- 2026 Week 12
- Date
- 2026-11-28
- Site
- Home
- Result
- Loss
- Record
- 10-2
Ohio 43, Vikings 42.
One point. At home. In the last game of the regular season, two days after my daughter sat at my table and said grace for both teams, out loud, “Lord, let everyone play well and nobody get hurt,” which is a very Bridget prayer and, I see now, was a very careful one.
I’m not going to pretend this one doesn’t hurt worse than the others. Nine straight wins. Five road wins in a row. Ten and one. And then the Bobcats came up from Athens and beat us by a single point in our own building. Tim Slocombe’s guys are tough, folks. They don’t go away. They just keep showing up at your door like a relative who knows where the good snacks are.
At 7:40 p.m., my phone buzzed. “sorry, Dad.” Green heart. Then, a minute later, another text: “it was the best game I’ve ever worked.” And you know what? She’s right. It was a great football game. It just ended on the wrong side of the one.
Ten and two. We’re going bowling. Zero pierogi. Leftover turkey, eaten in the dark.
There are losses that teach you something, and there are losses that just sit in your chest like a cold stone. This was the second kind.
One point to Ohio, at home, after nine straight wins, after the most impressive road trip I’ve ever covered. And here’s the hard part for a man who builds his whole personality on expecting the worst: I didn’t expect it. I’d let my guard down. I’d played the big band record. I’d stopped checking the closets.
Thanksgiving was lovely, which made Saturday worse. Bridget and I argued about Ohio’s defensive front for an hour. Sam and Kate talked wedding plans. Donna’s pierogi were statistically excellent again. Then two days later we all sat in the same stadium and watched one point decide whose house was happy.
I called my father Sunday. Foggy day. He asked who we’d played. I said Ohio. He said, “Ohio’s always tough, Kenny.” Same thing he said two years ago. Some things you forget. Some things you never do.
Back and forth
One point, Kenny.
I know, Mick.
Bridget said it was the best game she ever worked.
It was. That’s the worst part. Call her anyway.
One point, a great game on the wrong side, a careful Thanksgiving prayer, and the one thing Ray Hogmanes will never forget about Ohio.
Split Decision is fiction. Mickey Bridges, Ken Hogmanes and The Lakefront Ledger are invented; the games and scores are not.