Deep in the heart of Texans

While other University of Texas students lumber around campus, bleary-eyed from finals, Jeff Zell appears not to have a care in the world as he waits for his ride in front of the Original Jimmy John’s Sandwich Shop and unself-consciously licks mayonnaise and mustard off each of his fingers. Zell carries about him the air of a young man who regularly falls into fantastic situations, and considering he’s got a ticket to this year’s Rose Bowl, he’s living up to his image.

For the first time in its history, UT’s football team has been chosen to play in Pasadena, and the milestone has propelled a migration of thousands of Longhorn fans westward for the New Year’s Day game. They have no plans to spend much time in California, they’re quick to point out, but they want to make sure their team premieres with a Texas-sized cheering section.

Zell, asked how he managed to land a ticket, wolfs down the last of his dinner.

“My roommate’s girlfriend’s uncle,” he says as a final gulp of the sandwich sends his Adam’s apple bobbing up and down like a buoy. “I’m going!”

Devotion to University of Texas sports isn’t civil or seasonal. It’s as permanent as the life-sized sculpture of the Longhorn mascot, Bevo, that stands across the street from Jimmy John’s Sandwich Shop. And it’s as intense as the school color, burnt orange.

So it’s not surprising that UT students and alumni have already snatched up every one of the 23,000 tickets allotted to them for the controversial matchup against the University of Michigan (there are a lot of Cal fans who are fuming that the No. 4 Bears aren’t in the Rose Bowl and the No. 6 Longhorns are, but that’s another story). The main alumni group, the Texas Exes, is bringing 950 enthusiasts to L.A. by plane -- the largest group for an out-of-state game in that organization’s history.

Faced with the prospect of getting shut out of the game, some resourceful fans bought their tickets through Michigan’s website when they learned the Wolverines had not immediately sold out their allotment of seats. Others booked passage to Southern California, though they have yet to line up tickets and admit they have little chance of getting into the game. These die-hards say they are happy to travel more than 1,400 miles to watch the event on a random sports bar’s wide-screen TV.

What’s a little money and time? We’re talking the Longhorns here, after all.

Just talk to J. Scott Wilson, a 53-year-old attorney who prefers the term “rooter” rather than “fan” and says he has not missed a home or away game in 27 years. He’s driving out to Pasadena with two friends in his 2002 white Ford F-150 pickup.

“I bought it in white because they didn’t have burnt orange,” Wilson said apologetically.

Meanwhile, Frank Davis, 75, of Houston, and his 41-year-old son, Frank Barrett Davis Jr., are deserting their families for New Year’s Eve and flying to California with the Exes. They are staying at Loews Santa Monica Beach Hotel, where hundreds of burnt orange and white balloons will be released from the lobby’s high ceiling on New Year’s Eve.

“And we’ll tailgate,” the older Davis said. “You can bet I’ll be in orange from the waist up. Hook ‘em, Horns!”

Casual observers might feel uncomfortable with this level of dedication, and that is their prerogative. But they are squarely in the minority in this town where no act of devotion to the Horns is considered too extreme.

For thousands of Longhorn fans, the predictably busy holiday season has become even more hectic because of Rose Bowl logistics. Once it was made official that UT was going to Pasadena, the mad, strategic dash to secure tickets began with a blizzard of text messaging and cellphone calls.

It worked like this: Each senior was given first crack at four tickets at a face value of $125 each, an arrangement of tickets-by-seniority that threatened to leave freshmen and sophomores out in the cold. Savvy underclassmen jockeyed to locate a senior who would not be able to go to the game but who would pass along his or her tickets. Lucky younger students, like Amy Adolph, emerged triumphant and -- almost as crucially -- she proved to be fastidiously organized when it came to planning leisure time.

As soon as the 20-year-old public-relations major learned she had a seat at the game, she reserved an RV and firmed up commitments from three of her girlfriends and seven of their guy friends. They’re hitting I-10 today, with plans to stop at the Grand Canyon on the way to California. Their return trip will include a night in Vegas.

Other underclassmen were neither as lucky as Adolph nor as connected. These lost souls are bidding for tickets on EBay or other websites, hoping for an angel donor.

“I’m trying to get there, but it depends on how much money I end up spending on Christmas presents,” said Stephanie Weaver, a 20-year-old communications studies major from the Central Texas town of Corsicana.

“Every student on campus has started watching their money. You know, they’re like, ‘Don’t need to eat dinner tonight. Gotta save money!’ The cost of getting out to California is the problem.... Five hundred-plus dollars to get out there and stay in a hotel. And then,” Weaver said with sudden realization, “you’ve got to come back.”

For Rima Maatouk, 19, the game is an opportunity to break up what she envisions will be a long vacation in her hometown of Hallsville, in rural East Texas.

“I’ll be home for three to four weeks -- pretty much going crazy,” she said. As a yearbook photographer accustomed to getting field passes to big games, Maatouk describes herself as “spoiled” and says she is still hoping to get a free credential to the game.

“But even without it, I’ll fly to San Diego and watch it in a bar,” she said.

Missing in much of the excitement about the game is the initial wince-inducing method surrounding the Longhorns’ Bowl Championship Series selection. Even though the team was 10-1, Coach Mack Brown feared the squad would once again be overlooked by the sportswriters and broadcasters who rank the teams. Known for his political acumen, Brown -- who earned more than $2 million last year and stood to pull in another $50,000 if his team made it to the BCS -- chose a postgame news conference to plead his case for the Longhorns.

“This team deserves to be in the BCS,” Brown said. “To me, the voters should put us in.”

This kind of lobbying has traditionally been reserved for locker-room discussions or one-on-one phone conversations. But ultimately, Texas was chosen at the expense of higher-ranked Cal, which was thought to be a shoo-in for its first Rose Bowl since 1959.

“Roses are red, not yellow: Yes, we hang our Horns in shame that the road to the Granddaddy Bowl ... was paved with whining,” read a December issue of the Austin Chronicle, the free weekly alternative paper. “Now go kick some Wolverine ... .” (Texas goes into the game as 6-point favorites.)

For many fans, breaking into the BCS lends an importance to the game that legitimizes the Longhorns across conference boundaries.

“For UT, getting over the BCS hump adds that much more excitement,” said UT alum Chris DeGroot, 34, who is flying to California even though he doesn’t yet have a ticket to the game.

Dennis Burke, who graduated with an MBA from the university in 2002 and now lives in Coral Gables, Fla., is in the same situation as DeGroot. He’s paid for airfare even though his friends have not yet come through with tickets to the bowl.

“It’s the first BCS game, a chance to show the rest of the country that we don’t falter on the big stakes in major games. That’s at least the perception. A win here would silence those critics,” Burke said. “I’m a huge fan. I try to get to at least one game a year, and there was no way I was going to miss the game.”