It’s still the offseason, so I figured I’d give you the most cliched of all cliched topics: The time I attended my first Steelers game.

This happened during the 1988 season when Pittsburgh finished with a 5-11 record–or the worst one since Woodstock.

Nope, the Steelers could not find their way home that year, but they did play eight home games; I got to go to one of them at old Three Rivers Stadium. Anyway, I’m not sure if Blind Faith played at Woodstock in 1969, but Steelers fans certainly needed a lot of it to support their favorite football team 19 years later. Imagine if social media, blogs, podcasts and the ability to make film rooms all existed in 1988. Could you have justified making a film room about Bubby Brister? Sure, you had Louis Lipps, but what about Charles Lockett? Yes, you had Rod Woodson, Dwayne Woodruff and Thomas Everett….actually, now that I look at the Steelers 1988 roster, there was some potential there. Dermontti Dawson was just getting his feet wet as a future Hall of Fame center. John Jackson was also a rookie that year. Greg Lloyd was around, but nobody was yet sure why he was hired. Maybe it was because of his disposition? It was hard to say since he missed all of 1987 (his rookie season) with a knee injury. The Steelers were in the middle of forming the core of Bill Cowher’s playoff teams many years later, but nobody knew it at the time because we figured Chuck Noll would coach forever.

We just knew that the Steelers were mired in mediocrity almost a decade after their decade of dominance in the 1970s. Hell, mediocrity would have been preferable in 1988. What we got, instead, was a 1-6 start. Pittsburgh may have been nearly 10 years removed from its dynastic ways, but the fans and media were still hanging onto the idea of the team going on a run and getting back into the playoff race (I believe they refer to this today as entitled, privileged and delusional). Believe it or not, a 39-21 victory over the Broncos at TRS spurred on the postseason talk, but that rhetoric was mercifully put to rest thanks to consecutive road losses to the Jets and Bengals.

That brings me to November 13, 1988.

I don’t know how my family did it, but we scored two tickets to the Steelers game vs. the Philadelphia Eagles, their cross-state rivals. I say I don’t know how my family of working-class means came across two tickets to this game, but it probably had something to do with the 2-8 record. I went with my uncle. To give you some context, he was 15, and I was 16 (my uncle was a “miracle” baby). Anywho, my grandparents (my uncle’s parents) dropped us off, and we eventually made our way to our seats, which were fairly high up and on the visitors’ side at TRS. We were surrounded by boisterous Eagles fans. (Can you believe that?) It didn’t matter, though. I couldn’t believe I was at a Steelers game. I had been to a few Pirates games over the years but seeing my Steelers warming up in their black and gold uniforms was a dream come true. To give you some more context to show you just how much this football team meant to me at that time, remember another November 13 in more recent history? I’m talking about November 13, 2016. The Steelers had just lost at Heinz Field to another NFC East opponent, those gosh darn Cowboys. Mike Tomlin went for like 17 two-point conversions (they all failed), Cam Heyward was lost for the year with an injury, and the Steelers wasted a perfectly fine fake “clock it” that should have been the game-winner. But the defense couldn’t stop Zeke Elliott and Dak Prescott all day, and the Steelers dropped a heartbreaker to fall to 4-5. I didn’t care all that much, and that’s because I was getting ready for a second date over at this woman’s house. In other words, I was preoccupied with the idea of scoring my own touchdowns. I had no such thoughts on November 13, 1988. OK, I did, but I didn’t know what to do. I was a fat kid who wore sweatpants to school every day. Girls didn’t like me. I also had bad hair. Sure, at least I had hair, but I was mocked for my inability to do anything stylish with it. The Steelers were all I had at the time. They were mostly all I thought about.

I was honored to be among the 46,026 in attendance for this meaningless game against the Eagles.

How did the Steelers help me live my dream? By getting off to a 10-0 first-quarter start thanks to a Gary Anderson 52-yard field goal and a 13-yard touchdown pass from running back Merril Hoge to Lipps. The Eagles countered in the second quarter with two touchdown runs–one by Keith Byars and one by Randall Cunningham–but Pittsburgh jabbed back with two more field goals by Anderson to take a 16-14 halftime lead.

Philadelphia opened the second half scoring with a 34-yard field goal from Luis Zendejas to take a 17-16 lead. Then, the play I will always remember happened with 6:40 left in the third period: Brister took a snap from under center at his own 11 (Noll wasn’t into the shotgun yet). After dropping back, Brister stepped up in the pocket and scrambled to his right before unleashing a pass to Lipps downfield. Lipps caught it in stride and ran the rest of the way for an 89-yard touchdown.

The Steelers took a 23-17 lead, and the stands at old TRS were rocking. The play happened on my side of the field, and I can still picture it in my mind.

I was so darn happy at that moment.

Before I continue with the game highlights, let me take the time to tell you about what was going on in the stands. As I mentioned, we were sitting in the visitors section, which meant we were surrounded by many Eagles fans who had made the trip to see their 5-5 team play. We may have been in the visitors section, but there were a lot of Steelers fans mixed in with Eagles faithful. There was also a lot of beer being consumed. I know this because a Steelers fan threw his in the face of an Eagles fan who had just clocked him in the jaw. This kind of thing happened the entire day. Steelers dudes and Eagles dudes fighting in the stands below us (yes, they were all dudes–pardon my sexism). My uncle and I spent most of the afternoon standing on our seats because that was the only way we could see the action. In addition to the highlights and the fighting, the thing I remember most from that day was security guards dressed in yellow jackets breaking up fights every few minutes.

Back to the game action.

The Eagles took a 27-26 fourth-quarter lead thanks to another Cunningham touchdown run and a second Zendejas kick sandwiched around a fourth Anderson field goal.

The Steelers had the ball and one last chance to win with precious seconds remaining. Brister scrambled around and found Lipps at the Philadelphia 39-yard line. There was only enough time left to send Anderson out to try a 57-yard field goal. I can still see him swinging his leg in warmup fashion as he ran out onto the field. There was no doubt in my mind that Anderson, the Justin Tucker of his day but from 10 yards closer, would make this field goal. Steelers fans all around me–including my uncle–were screaming, “Come on, Gary!”

It was blocked.

Final score: Them 27, Us 26.

Oh well, I still had a blast. I thought about that game all day in school on Monday. I waited to see the highlights of it that night on Monday Night Football. That’s right, a 27-26 loss to an eventual playoff team was to Steelers fans back then what exit velocity is to Pirates fans now.

I mentioned Ryan. He was in his third season as the Eagles head coach and would lead them to a 10-6 record and the NFC East title that year.

Ryan was involved in a bitter feud with Bears head coach Mike Ditka stemming from the former’s days as Chicago’s egotistical defensive coordinator. I hated Ditka and the Bears when I was a teenager. Sure, Ditka was from Pittsburgh, but he was a loudmouth jag and his players were equally as bombastic and cocky. Other than Sweetness, Walter Payton, I had no use for Da Bears of the 1980s.

Anyway, the Eagles would go on to lose to Chicago in the divisional round of the playoffs that year. I likely wanted Philadelphia to win back then. However, I’ve changed my tune over the years and now think it’s hilarious that fog rolled into Soldier Field during halftime of that game and ruined any chance that the Eagles and their more high-powered offense could come back to win. I’m now on Team Ditka when it comes to the Ditka/Ryan feud. For one thing, Ditka is from Pittsburgh. Sure, he’s a loudmouth jag, but at least you know where he’s coming from. Ryan was just a smarmy jerk. He was the kind of guy who would steal an Amazon package off your porch while looking straight into your doorbell camera and saying, “What are you going to do about it?” And you probably wouldn’t do a damn thing about it because he was just so charismatic that he’d get the people on his side–including the cops.

This concludes the story of the day I went to my first Steelers game at old Three Rivers Stadium.

Sure, they lost, but it’s a time I’ll always cherish.