SPARTAN TRAVELS 18 HOURS, MAKES KICKOFF

MSU alumnus Derek Wallbank is a journalist for Bloomberg NEWS in Washington, D.C. He'd waited for years in hopes of seeing the Spartan football team take on competitors closer to his home. In the wee hours of Nov. 14, he wrapped up a trip to Switzerland and activated a well-oiled travel plan to cross six time zones so he could be in the stands as the Spartans took on Maryland's Terrapins. Here's his tale: 

"Have you come a long way?" the Maryland fan behind me asked as MSU's first Big Ten conference football game in College Park kicked off.

"This morning, I was in Switzerland," I replied.

Yes, Switzerland. My body, which had been up since the Eastern Time equivalent of midnight the day before, thought it was 2 a.m. the next day. I don't know if there's a record for longest same-day trip to a Spartan football game, but standing there, six time zones after my travel day started, I knew I didn't want to try and break the one I'd just set for myself.

A brief note about my football silliness that'll put this in perspective: I started my career in journalism working for the Spartan Radio Network, holding a parabolic microphone on the sidelines of Spartan Stadium during one good and two truly terrible MSU football seasons. Didn't matter, I was hooked.

I've followed MSU to most Big Ten stadiums, from Beaver to Camp Randall and, now living in the Maryland suburbs of Washington, D.C., I was selfishly overjoyed when Maryland joined the Big Ten. Even more thrilled -- they were coming to the new Big Ten East. That meant that Michigan State football, every two years, would play in a stadium just a 10 minute drive from my front door.

So I was giddy when the 2014 schedule came out and showed MSU playing at College Park in mid-November.

There was just one slight problem with the plan. On game day, I'd be in Switzerland. Specifically, it'd be the very last day of a week-long fellowship in Zurich.

Well now that would be impossible, I thought. Unless...

What if it was a night game? Well, that's an 8 p.m. kickoff. And what if I took the very earliest flight back? A quick check of Swiss International Airlines' schedule showed a flight that left around 9 a.m. and got into JFK about 1 p.m.

Maybe this was doable?

Well, Providence and the Big Ten Network are apparently buddies, because sure enough, the game got scheduled for a night kickoff. And as soon as I heard, I booked that very early flight. 

Now all I had to worry about was the changeover. This was going to be a logistical challenge. But a solvable one.

There's a program called Global Entry that speeds up customs. Considering I had a couple of customs-passing trips I had to do, that was worth the expense. That'd get me the TSA pre-check too, so security would be a breeze. But what about check-in? I've had problems with that before. Oooh -- Delta could upgrade me to First Class for the 50-minute JFK-DCA flight for the cost of my two bags I'd have to check anyway... and that'd guarantee quick check-in. Sold!

The Swiss flight couldn't have been more efficient. It's the Swiss, what can I say? Their national airline is just as efficient as you'd imagine. And credit to Delta, they were just as on-time.

It was 7 p.m. when I turned onto Paint Branch Drive and the campus of the University of Maryland. A short jaunt to the assigned parking lot later and it was 7:30 p.m. when I walked into Byrd Stadium.

I'd made it with 30 minutes to spare.

Minutes later, my friends arrived. My wife, originally from metro Detroit, sprinted over for a Love Actually-style hug that was very much needed after a week away. Following her were two long-time friends I met in student government, one now a researcher at Purdue, and another now a police officer in Chicago, both of whom had made the trip just for this game.

At halftime, we met up with another Spartan buddy of mine. He's now in northern Virginia after growing up in Okemos. His new wife is a Notre Dame fan at heart, but wore green and white because she's a good sport. A couple rows over was one of the biggest Spartan athletics fans I know, up from Austin, Texas. And as the fourth quarter ticked down to a close, two buddies I met after moving to D.C. -- one of whom has since started grad school in North Carolina -- made a surprise visit to my section.

We'd each arrived in College Park after our own journeys, some near, some far, some stretching the bounds of same-day logistics. Yet there we were, together, one disparate-yet-united Spartan family.

It reminded me of that second verse to the MSU alma mater: "When from these scenes we wander and twilight shadows fade. Our mem'ry still will linger where light and shadow played."