Top 25 College Tailgates

BE LIKE MIKE 

- Loyd Mcintosh, Kelly Rogers Flynt & Carla Jean Whitley

There is a student at Michigan State we interviewed for this year’s edition of the Top 25 who goes by the Twitter handle Sparty Mike. He’s a graduate of the university and now in medical school there. He’s a fan of the Spartans. Scratch that. He’s a serious fan of the Spartans. An incredibly, devoted, rowdy, intense, slightly-off-his-rocker, but awesome nonetheless fan. How serious of a fan is Sparty Mike? He wears a Michigan State helmet to every home game. Every. home. game. Hell, yeah!

This, dear hearts, is why we love college football. We know the NFL and NASCAR have their share of boisterous fans, but they pale in comparison to the passion, pride and sheer lunacy of college football. While at other sports, tailgating is an activity; for college football, tailgating is a lifestyle. A lifestyle bordering on an art form, and occasionally tilting toward sociopathic behavior. But just a smidge.

So Tailgater is pleased as punch to present our 2018 Top 25 College Tailgates. Read it, argue about it, and, by all means, let us know where we got it all wrong—and right. But make sure you get out there this fall and be like Mike. Sparty Mike.

#25 BOISE STATE UNIVERSITY

BOISE STATE IS INNOVATIVE. You can’t think of BSU without immediately conjuring images of the blue turf, dubbed “Smurf Turf.” No other school has anything remotely like it, and no one ever will. The blue turf was installed in 1986, just one year before the NCAA updated its regulations for colored turf. Grandfathered in, Boise’s blue will remain an anomaly in collegiate football, and Broncos fans are just fine with that.

Boise State thrust the same innovative thinking into their tailgating. In 2013, the university and local police recognized how fast tailgating was growing on campus and took steps. BSU set up a “10 to 10 Zone.”