For those of us who have watched folks from all over the country enjoy college football success, I was struck this morning with an opportunity to talk a little tackle football with a guy I didn’t know from the Man in the Moon.

I was riding an elevator at a Barnes & Noble Booksellers store in Frisco, Texas, when a fellow wearing a bright green shirt with a bright yellow “O” emblazoned on its front walked into the elevator.

I looked for just a second at the guy’s shirt and blurted out “Go, Ducks.” His face lit up like my Christmas tree at home … or likely at his home, too. “Yeah, it’s going to be a great game on Wednesday,” he said. Yep. The “great game” will feature the No. 1- ranked Oregon Ducks against The Ohio State Buckeyes in the Rose Bowl.

We both chuckled at the notion that the Ducks now belong to the Big Ten football conference, which he and I admitted we had learned to hate growing up in Oregon. He hails from Klamath Falls; I was raised in Portland. “All my friends have moved from K Falls to Portland,” he said, “so I still have a lot of friends in Oregon.”

Why hate the Big Ten? Because the Ducks belonged to the Pac-12 but then gravitated this past year to the Big Ten. The Ducks won the Big Ten championship and will represent that conference as its champs against Ohio State, a perennial Big Ten powerhouse. The Ducks had beaten the Buckeyes earlier this year in Eugene, a 32-31 nailbiter. Our goal every year was to cheer on the Pac-12 in the Rose Bowl, which historically pitted the Pacific Coast conference against the Big Ten champs.

The Pac-12 is now down to the “Pac-2,” with just Oregon State and Washington State remaining in what once was a proud football conference. “It’s better than being in the Pac-2,” he said. Indeed …

We went our ways. I am sure we’ll end up metaphorically in the same place on Wednesday afternoon, in front of our respective TV sets cheering on the University of Oregon against Ohio State.

Go, Ducks!