INGLEWOOD, Calif. — The low point made me laugh, if nothing else.
A friend and I were riding in a Lyft late Monday night, our TCU gear drenched in rain and soaking the back seat of a Tesla.
I asked the driver when the last time Los Angeles saw this kind of weather. He didn't have to think about it.
"Never!"
And so the thought of it, true or not, was funny: We had arrived on the worst weather day in the best weather city to watch the worst football game from our school's best team ever.
Sometimes you win.
Sometimes you play Georgia.
Sometimes the skies open up in a cruel dose of added punishment.
They did what Kirby Smart said they would: They hunted, and they did, in fact, "f--- their a-- up."
Georgia won 65-7.
None of which should take away from TCU's magical championship run.
Sonny Dykes took over a 5-7 team and led it to the national championship. And, more than that, he led TCU to the national championship. Even at this team's peak, a title game felt far away -- a spot reserved for the Georgias and Alabamas of the world.
So, as an alumnus and fan myself, I had to go. I had to be there.
And I don't regret it.
Weighing the cheaper options, I flew to Las Vegas on Sunday, and stayed with family there for a night, then flew to L.A. first thing Monday morning. Fellow TCU fans flooded every leg of my journey to California, a surge of purple heading west.
I met up with my friend, who was also arriving Monday morning, and we took together a quick Uber ride to SoFi, the sprawling, canopied stadium that opened in 2020.
Most fans huddled at the casino in the SoFi parking lot before the game, or pregamed at the official school tailgates. A light rain dampened the vibes, but no matter: We were all itching and ready to get into the stadium for the game.
Inside SoFi, we worked our way to a second-level concourse, where hundreds more TCU fans gathered in awe of the stage the Frogs had reached.
I looked across the field, where TCU was warming up. A massive College Football Playoff logo covered midfield. The words "National Championship" were painted below it.
I soaked it all in.
TCU in a national championship game.
Was this real life?
Georgia quickly reminded me that it was no dream.
'He's a walk-on!'
Right away, the Bulldogs kicked TCU in the teeth.
The Frogs got the ball to start the game, punted after three plays and then Georgia quarterback Stetson Bennett scampered for a 21-yard touchdown.
Between barks, a Georgia fan in our section reminded me of a fun fact about Bennett: "He's a walk-on!"
Well, he's also 25, I thought. But it didn't matter. The guy made plays.
TCU responded with a touchdown to cut Georgia's lead to 10-7, but then the Dawgs scored again, and forced another TCU punt.
Bennett drove Georgia into TCU territory to the Frogs' 45-yard-line. Trailing 17-7, TCU needed a stop. They stuffed Georgia on first down, and Bennett's second-down pass fell incomplete. The Bulldogs faced 3rd and 10.
This was it, I remembered thinking. The play of game, as early as it was.
TCU linebacker Dee Winters blitzed from the edge with a clear path to Bennett. But Bennett spun to his left, and Winters lost the angle. So Bennett kept scrambling -- for 12 yards and the first down.
Whether I thought it at the time, I know it now: TCU was done for at that point.
Georgia scored again. And again. And by the time they made it 38-7 shortly before the half, we TCU fans were already numb.
Somehow, the best was behind us.
Top Dawgs and wet Frogs
When the Los Angeles weather is perfect, as I assume it generally is, it's hard to imagine there's a better stadium than SoFi.
On TV, it looks like any other mega-dome, a newer version of AT&T Stadium. In person, it's more of a luxury patio, with large openings on both ends to allow for an ocean breeze, and maybe even an ocean view, plus a translucent roof to brighten the playing field.
Monday was not one of those perfect weather days.
Much of the day's weather involved a steady drizzle at worst and a light mist at best. Not quite sunny California, but not the worst thing in the world.
Then about midway through the second quarter, almost in cue with TCU's collapse, the rain picked up significantly. I know this because it started raining inside the stadium.
Either it was coming through the ceiling or blowing through the open endzone seating area, but water was finding its way into SoFi.
I still can't complain much. Our seats, high as they were, avoided the rain gusts those on the opposite side of the stadium endured.
On social media, you can see video of rain gusting into the TCU section.
Because of course it was the TCU section.
Don't worry, though. I still got soaked.
We strategized leaving the game a few minutes early, hoping to beat the celebrating Georgia fans to an Uber away from the stadium.
That went about as well as TCU's game plan.
We stepped outside to a monsoon, hustled over to the rideshare zone (hopping a few gushing streams in the process) and pulled up the Uber app.
And we waited.
And waited.
And the rain got stronger, the crowds got bigger and the Uber app... well, it just stayed the same, "finalizing" our driver details for over 10 minutes.
We realized an Uber or Lyft or cab or boat wasn't finding us anytime soon. So we set off walking toward the hotel, not attempting to walk the full three miles to it but to at least make some headway in that general direction, away from the rideshare scrum.
The whole time, it kept raining. My hoodie was soaked. My friend held a pizza box over his head.
Walking along the SoFi property, we saw other fans in the same situation: Wet Dawgs and Frogs huddled under sidewalk awnings, packed inside a 7-Eleven, hollering on the phone at a lost Uber driver.
We made it four blocks to a diner, and we found a booth in a back dining room. We took another try at an Uber, and we got another whiff. But at least we had a roof over our heads, and that's all that really mattered.
We called it a victory, and we kept trying for a ride.
The room was a mix of depressed TCU fans and celebrating Dawgs.
A Georgia fan joked that the room felt like a TCU wake. He wasn't far off.
Uber and Lyft still couldn't find us a driver. Our phones were dying. My call to a cab company ended up in an automated phone tree that couldn't recognize our address.
After about an hour of waiting, my friend's phone finally got the notification: Our Lyft driver was 20 minutes away.
On the app, we followed along as he approached the diner, and then flagged down his Tesla. We were in the clear, nearly frozen, but arrived back at the hotel in under 10 minutes.
We cranked the heater and hung up our wet clothes as we tried to forget about the game and the weather and the mess of a night.
Then, on the flight home the next day, I thought about it: The Georgia fans Monday night dealt with the same rainy weather, the same rideshare nightmare, the same soaked clothes.
But the Bulldogs fans we saw in the back of that diner were singing their fight song.
I learned at least one thing on this trip: A championship will keep you dry.
