Note: This will be a running feature, profiling all twelve West Virginia opponents through stereotypes, gross generalizations, and little-to-no research. It should be groundbreaking. Enjoy.
Apparently Coastal Carolina is a school, and I have it on good account that they have a football team and certainly plan on playing West Virginia on our scheduled date of September 4th. This is all very exciting, mostly because it's the first game, but also because it's the first game. Really, that's the only reason why it's exciting. But please, keep reading, there's so much more to talk about.
Further good news is that I have approximately four more weeks to figure out what the hell a Chanticleer is (four weeks sounds like a lot, and all I'd have to do is go to Wikipedia, but let's face it, that probably won't happen). I do know their colors are teal and bronze, however, so until I look it up, I am going to assume it looks something like this:
OK, fine, I broke down a looked it up. As it turns out, Coastal Carolina's official website has an entire page devoted to explaining what a Chanticleer really is: a proud and fierce rooster that dominates the barnyard. First off, a proud rooster? Are we now able to determine the self-esteem levels of fowl? And second, why is it always mascots that have to do with small, mostly flightless birds that lends itself to pompous, ridiculous explanations of its origins? If you had a real mascot, we would just know what it is. WVU's mascot is a guy (most of the time they have guy parts, 1990, 2009, and probably 2004-2006 notwithstanding) with a musket -- it doesn't get much easier than that.
I have no idea what school serves as Coastal Carolina's main rival, but I assume there's a bitter feud with East Carolina over the school's name. You see, East Carolina (probably) tried to market itself as being the school closest to the coast of both Carolinas, hence the "East.". Make sense? Good. Then, Coastal Carolina, like the asshole that bids $1 on The Price Is Right, comes and beats them to the coast territory. Bastards! A bitter feud ensued that only ended with the Chanticleers finally vanquishing the Pirates in basketball 63-55 on December 28, 2008 in front of a raucous crowd of 1,137. World War III was averted. Whew.
Other than that, I don't think Coastal Carolina will pose much trouble. They'll likely throw some passes, run some runs, punt more than a few times, pick up their massive one-game check, and leave town. I will get overly drunk and sunburned because, hey, I have a first-game ritual that involves getting overly drunk and sunburned. And then we'll have a short week to get ready for Marshall, a team I know significantly more about but also respect significantly less than a team represented by a proud and fierce rooster.
Go figure.