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Football and Fall

Will Cherrin's guide to everything football.

By Will Cherrin

It's always hard to find an upside to fall. The weather gets bad, the days get short and school starts up again. But in spite of all this, fall may be my favorite time of the year. It's hard to explain my feelings, but to sum them up in a few words: Football is the best thing in the world.

Whether it's college or pro, football and everything associated with it is what keeps me running early in the school year. And for those of you looking for a nice little supplement to school here's my foolproof plan to use football to avert the autumn blues.

Number One: Fantasy Football
Having your own fantasy football team is one of the greatest feelings known to man. If you're turning on your computer to write that essay due tomorrow, you may as well check on your fantasy football team.

For those who don't know, here's a breakdown of how it works. You begin by drafting various NFL players from all different teams for specified positions on your fantasy squad. The stats that your players get in real life games translate into points for your team; the better they do, the more points you get. The fantasy team with the most points at the end of the NFL season wins.

Yahoo Sports has a free fantasy football league that's well organized and easy to use. With Yahoo, you can also make a private league in which you are only competing against friends. For those who are interested, here's a tip: Though we all like flashy players like Donovan McNabb more than players like Kurt Warner, if you are looking to win you may want to go with the Kurt Warner-type because he puts up better stats week in and week out.

Number Two: Video Games
If it's football season, it must be football video game season. Buy EA Sports' Madden 2003 and NCAA Football 2003. Playing these games gets you even more juiced for the weekend games to come. Start a season with your favorite team and play during the week...after you've finished your homework.

Number Three: Attend A Game
The experience of a live football game is one that everyone should have at least once. It's much more exciting than watching on TV, and the tickets aren't that expensive. Going to a game is also a great excuse not to do homework on Sunday morning. We all know that homework is meant for Sunday night, and if there is something to do in the morning we can keep it that way.

Number Four: Sunday Night Highlights
NFL Primetime is a great show to watch, for anyone who wants a little end-of-the-week excitement. It's entertaining enough to just watch the highlights, but if you're really looking for a challenge, try to guess who the hosts' primetime players will be. They usually pick the best players of the day or the ones who had the most impact on the game.

My last tip is, even if it's only week eight, start thinking about the playoffs. Try to find out what your favorite team needs to do to get a playoff berth. Look at the standings and the remaining schedules of the teams in contention to find out who to root against in the closing weeks. It's not too hard to think of your own ways to use football to get your mind off school. And if your favorite team is like mine, they will be mathematically eliminated from playoff contention in week one, so you'll have a lot of time to think about it.

— Will Cherrin is an intern at Youth Radio.