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"Back in the day", there would be one game per week on TV, in distorted color because our TV was pretty bad.  It would nearly always be a "Blue Blood" team, rarely UGA or Tech, and I was a fan of both at the time.  My Dad would watch the games and we'd listen to the UGA or Tech games on the radio.  My family nearly all went to UGA (my mom went to Tennessee but we tried to keep that a secret).  I had aspirations of being an architect or civil engineer until I was a senior in HS, so it seemed clear I'd be going to Tech.  My parents, my mom really, wouldn't let me play football, so perhaps it seemed like a cool sport to me, and most of the cool guys in HS played football.

I ended up of course at UGA with a small scholarship and an interest in physics until I discovered you needed to be smart to major in physics, but the football environment there was overwhelming really.  The Dawgs were only good one year while I was there, but football (and tennis) really consumed the campus aside from the hippie types who pretended to disdain it.  The stadium sat 64 K as I recall and about 5,000 people would sit on the tracks at the open end of the stadium and watch for free.

My interest ebbed in the 90s when the Dawgs were consistently mediocre and I had moved away and got more interested in baseball for some obscure reason.  But, I digress.

I don't recall much "tail gating" when I was on campus except people literally eating sandwiches out of the back of their pickup trucks.  The weather in Athens ion October is often perfect, and even in November it is nice.  Folks would bring a picnic basket and eat before the game to save some money.  That obviously "evolved" to the massive tail gates we see today with generators and bars and all sorts of food and sofas and TVs and whatever else.

The Sunday paper would have large B&W photos of the key plays in the game.  They would have two sports sections, one for football and one for "other", and of course the Atlanta paper would have to cover Clemson and Auburn and Tennessee and Alabama in considerable detail, they'd get a page each, and UGA and Tech would get 3-4 pages each.

My first game in person was at Tech when they played UGA who won in the last minute with a TD run in 1971, I think it was.  It's still a hazy memory.  My guess is our "fandom" reflects where we grew up and where we attended college about 90% of the time.

yup, watching on the BW TV in the late 60's

Woody Hayes v. Bo Schembechler

and good vs evil - Huskers v. Sooners

I was a Buckeye fan and had plenty of family from Omaha that loved the Huskers - so of course I rooted for the bad boy Sooners

also adopted the Minnesoota Vikings in the mid 60s

was always a sports fan, baseball, football, basketball, olympic sports, Wide World of Sports, and the "American Sportsman" with Curt Gowdy

yup, watching on the BW TV in the late 60's

Woody Hayes v. Bo Schembechler

and good vs evil - Huskers v. Sooners

I was a Buckeye fan and had plenty of family from Omaha that loved the Huskers - so of course I rooted for the bad boy Sooners

also adopted the Minnesoota Vikings in the mid 60s

was always a sports fan, baseball, football, basketball, olympic sports, Wide World of Sports, and the "American Sportsman" with Curt Gowdy

Dad was alum of UNL, so really had no choice but to root for the Huskers and Thanksgivings all revolved around the NU / OU game.  

Living in South Dakota meant no pro team, so chose the Vikings cause purple was one of my favorite colors, lol.  Rooted for them and the "purple people eaters" all through their Super Bowl losses and all the futile years between then and now.  Still a fan.  

My buddy was all into this pro team, the 49ers, who weren't any good, but had a good quarterback out of Notre Dame. I started watching with him at just the right time, when I was 7, when they went 13-3 and won their first Super Bowl just after I turned 8. They stayed pretty good for a while.

Turns out my parents had gone to the Stanford/Ohio State Rose Bowl and because we lived close to Stanford, my mom started taking me to games when I was in middle school (I think). There was a big Cal/Stanford rivalry in our extended family (my dad went to Stanford, seemed like my mom's whole family--save for her--went to Cal).

When I went to Wisconsin I learned what real college football was like and I haven't been able to quit it.

My dad was some star HS RB in his youth and watched a lot of football by the time I was a kid.  My earliest memories of football is pretending to be Barry Sanders when playing with friends at daycare (OK State days), attending the Hall of Fame Bowl (Outback) after the '87 season, attending the Gator Bowl ('89 season), and Raghib Ismail's non-punt return TD in the Orange Bowl (after '90 season).  

I do have the excuse of coming of age and starting my fandom of Florida the same exact year Spurrier showed up - so I grew up knowing nothing but winning, brashness, and scoring.  So the last 8 years has been f-ing weird.

Add to all that I played Pop Warner in 5th grade (~1990), and I was hooked for life.  My obsessions with basketball and NFL football have waned, but I'm still a nut for baseball and college football.

always loved the game since i can remember- but my appreciation really took root when i grasped the concepts of team.  there is no other game with as many moving parts working to the same ends as football- QB's can't pass without protection nor can RB's run without the hogs making lanes- a QB needs receivers to throw to.. a Safety, no matter how good, needs to be able to close on the ball and unless somebody picks up one of the blockers to free his job, it ain't gonna happen... add to the mechanisms in concert, the strategy of knowing what needs to be done reconciled against what can be done adds an entire new flavor and spices the whole concept.  

football is much like prize fighting in that one fighter can beat another, but the other can be yet another just to have the third be able to beat the first- it's all about match-ups and application.... much more than that, though, it's about team... at least 10k times i've said this to this group- but a team playing in their comfort zone, which is in unison and as one and with confidence, is damn hard to stop no matter if they are weak in some places.  the strength of team draws away from weakness and to strength while the opponent sniffs for weakness.  all other sports i can think of can stand on the merit of individuals giving 100% effort, but in football, if that effort isn't directed toward the collective goal, rarely does anything great happen.   i was an adult before i truly appreciated the game, prior to that it was just an outlet. 

In the fall we'd cut wood for the winter.   Dad would take us out early and cut while my brother and I messed around in the creek.   Before the game started, dad would shut off the chainsaw, turn on the radio, open the doors to the pickup and we'd load the wood into the truck as we listened to the game.   I fell in love with the huskers over the radio and wanted nothing more than to be Mike Rozier.  

Looking back, I realize for me, Nebraska football was more than a game.. it was time with dad.   Such a different experience than watching it on TV with my son.