Best untold stories of college football's Rivalry Week - ESPN

Ah, Thanksgiving weekend, when the family gathers around the table and digs into a smorgasbord of traditional family dishes that instantly take us back in time by way of taste, smell and the memories to which those sensations are forever connected.

But it is also Rivalry Week, when college football contests involving teams and fan bases who do not particularly like each other find themselves in the midst of a similar holiday experience. When the sights, sounds and sensory overload of being inside a college football stadium also open the doors to the deepest recesses of our memory banks.

And then there is that region in between, where the truly bizarre and barely explainable kick-start the strangest of recollections. You know, like that casserole your Aunt Edith uncovers that leaves the family to spend the rest of the afternoon wondering WTH was baked in that CorningWare.

Or that jersey number being worn by the guy four rows in front of you, in the colors of thine enemy, that spawns stories of seething spitefulness that could only be born in the bizarro world of college football.

Or Aunt Edith's ice box.

Or when her sister, Aunt Connie, gets into the sherry and starts spinning yarns about your parents that you've never heard before. Especially that one about them during Rivalry Week back in the day when they helped steal State U's mascot.

The untold stories. The ones that give our lives — and college football — a little extra. That's what we're here to share with you. The untold stories, little-known details and forgotten tidbits that make Rivalry Week so special. Slow cooked to perfection over all these years. Like Aunt Edith's casserole. — Ryan McGee

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Ohio State's double-bird man
Bad blood between the