Tim McGraw, water skiing, spitting, & other reasons to hate Louisiana-Monroe

We’re debuting a new feature this week at Tomahawk Nation: the opponent hate guide. For the record, I’ve never been to ULM, but I did stop in Monroe for a bite while driving to cover FSU’s 2014 opener against Oklahoma State in Texas. And that’s when I saw that I still had 284 miles left until Dallas, which included driving through Shreveport. Not cool, Monroe.

Let’s start with the fact that I have to enter a two-word, hyphenated title when referring to this Sun Belt institution. Look, every college football fan knows Louisiana State University, which has the courtesy of going by the tight initialism of LSU. But could there just be one University of Louisiana, and not this UL-Monroe and UL-Lafeyette garbage? Honestly, you should have to be more relevant for me to type this many words.

Then again, the state also can’t make a call on its nickname. Louisiana is listed as the Sugar State, the Pelican State, and the Creole State. Even Florida has settled on the Sunshine State. And when the state of Florida makes you look disorganized, man, get it together.

ULM’s most famous alumnus is country singer Tim McGraw. In 1994, he released a song titled “Don’t Take the Girl,” which made me kinda dig country music for like four minutes. Inexcusable, Tim. I can never get those four minutes back, minutes that I could have spent listening to Jodeci.

McGraw also played Sandy Bullock’s husband (yeah, I call her Sandy, deal with it) in The Blind Side. It’s a great true story and all, but it’s also one of those movies that people mistake as a sports movie, when in fact, it’s not. Yeah, sports ball things happen, but it’s really not about football, the same way Rocky is a love story cleverly disguised as a boxing flick.

Another reason to hate Louisiana-Monroe: sheer, bitter jealousy. The Warhawks are more dominant at one sport than FSU has ever been and probably ever will be in any sport: water skiing. ULM has won 28 national championships in water skiing since competition began in 1979. I don’t know how to ski on water or snow, so screw them.

Oh and let’s not forget that Louisiana-Monroe DE Kerry Starks has been suspended for this game after allegedly spitting in the face of a Grambling State player during last weekend’s game. Again, not cool.