It’s 7 a.m. on Sunday; the world is asleep, still enjoying its day of rest. I am awake and ready to go. Sitting next to me, on my couch, are two of my friends, one, a blonde giant from Sweden, the other a witty brunette from Finland. It doesn’t make sense, every day during the week we have to drag ourselves to CRCE for 6:30 a.m. basketball practice. I should be taking advantage of my Sunday opportunity to sleep in. My friends should have been sleeping after having gone out the night before. But we were up. This is what a rivalry match will do to you.

It was the morning of the gold medal hockey game between the Swedes and the Finns, one of the world’s finest sports rivalries. Players on both sides agreed that their feelings for each other were stronger than a rivalry, but just shy of hatred. With a gold medal on the line, and the chance to hear a game full of bantering from my Swedish and Finnish friends, this was not a game I would miss for the world.

This is what rivalries will do to you. The feeling of a rivalry game is palpably different than any other event. I guarantee you did not get as excited about Illinois’ win over Minnesota Tuesday as you will be when the Illini beat Michigan State on Saturday (yes, I just made a prediction).

Rivalries bring with them histories of conflict to fuel the adrenaline rushes of fan and player alike. Whether it is the recent history of a battle for supremacy in the Big Ten, or the century-old duals that make every Red Sox-Yankees game a must-see TV, rivalry games mean more.

I remember growing up outside D.C., in Terps basketball country (this was after the John Thompson era at Georgetown). It didn’t matter how poorly the season was going, if Maryland beat Duke, you had to watch out for riots on campus.

The same could be said for Redskins-Cowboys games. Though a Redskins victory never ensued riots – and though there never were many Redskins victories – whenever the two teams played it was on the front page of the Washington Post and was all the D.C. area talked about for the following week.

That is why I was up at 7 in the morning on a Sunday. It was to watch Mina, the Finn, taunt Lars, the Swede, after Finland took a one to nothing lead into the second period. It was amazing to watch Lars curse in Finnish – the only Finnish he knows – before going to throw-up (a gift from the night before) only to return to the couch to cheer for his beloved Swedes.

It felt like heaven when the Swedes tied the game in the second period and Lars never ceased babbling on about how it was the second power play line for the Swedes that scored, throwing a little salt in the wound. This was followed by a long diatribe about how Zetterburg is the man – a womanizer, but the man – and how Forsberg is the best hockey player in the world. When Sweden scored the go-ahead goal and Mina screamed at the TV every time the Finns touched the puck until they scored the equalizer late in the period, I thought it couldn’t get any better.

But it did. Sweden scored goal number three, nine seconds into the third period and never looked back. Lars kicked up his taunting to another gear, calling Finland Sweden’s little brother and progressing into calling Finland Sweden’s “retarded cousin.” Mina tried countering by recalling a World Championships victory Finland had over Sweden in Sweden, but to no avail. After the game, with Sweden standing atop the podium, Mina had to pull Lars out of the apartment, with the latter in the throes of the Swedish national anthem.

That is why I was up so early on a Sunday morning.

But now, with the Olympics over, I must patiently wait for the next event to bring with it the adrenaline of intercontinental taunting. Never fear, because with the madness comes its own kind of rivalry. Adieu.

Josh George is a senior in Communications. He can be reached at [email protected].