It’s almost 1 a.m. on Sunday morning in L.A., and I’m exhausted. I have no Internet connection to fact-check and no coffee to help make my words coherent. In theory this shouldn’t be the ideal time to start writing my column, but what else can I do? Sleep?

I am sure by the time you are reading this that you already know what just happened, that the Stanford football team defeated USC in the closest of all close games only a few short hours ago, but that doesn’t do justice to the scenes replaying in my head. I just witnessed—first-hand and confronted by an overwhelming majority of opposing fans—the greatest game of college football, and perhaps even of any sport, I have ever seen. As if you need any proof, the friend I traveled down here with, a far more knowledgeable football fan than I, could do nothing more than sit in stunned silence for a long, long time after the fumble that gave the win to Stanford.

Supporting any team is a risk. Unless you pick that lucky year when your team goes undefeated all the way to a national title, you are going to have to deal with defeat. Traveling to an away game steps it up a notch: if you lose you can’t just slink home in anonymity. You’ll have to deal with the taunting of a few tens of thousands of happy enemy fans and face a long, depressing trip home.

As this was my first college football away game, I knew it was going to be special the minute I walked into the In-N-Out Burger halfway to L.A. to be greeted by a restaurant packed with Cal fans. As the lone customer sporting Stanford gear, the crowd immediately turned on me, chanting, “Take off that red shirt.” I was the center of attention. It was awesome. Fast-forward one day and I was sitting in one of the largest stadiums I’ve had the fortune to visit, a former Olympic venue, a vast bowl dug into the Southern California dirt and packed with USC fans. In the tiniest of tiny corners, the Red Zone was huddled together, outnumbered and outgunned by the voices of so many Trojans giving everything they had.

This was a game Stanford was just not destined to win. The Cardinal fell behind for the first time all season in the third quarter and many times after that. Coming back from a 10-point deficit looked tough, and squaring the game after conceding an interception for a touchdown with just three minutes left looked impossible. When Stanford tied the game and USC wasted its chance at a last-gasp field goal, letting the clock run down to zero, the Cardinal faithful went crazy. Somehow there was still a chance of taking the victory.

And win Stanford did. More than any of those 25-point-or-more victories, perhaps this game was the test and proof of a real national championship contender. The best teams not only win when life is going well; they somehow find a way to secure victory when it’s not.

Everyone I know, many Cardinal fans among them, is looking for reasons to rule Stanford out of a possible national title run, and there are enough out there: a struggling defense, the game against Oregon, a so-far unbeaten Oklahoma State, and even Boise State’s perennial demands to be given that shot. In fact, I sometimes get the feeling that because we are so sure that disappointment is going to come at some point, fans would rather get a defeat over and done with instead of stringing out their hopes.

But hopes and dreams are what sports are all about. We have to remember where we are: this is Stanford. We shouldn’t even be in this position; everyone knows that. My aforementioned friend even admitted before the game that he had previously considered going to USC instead of the Farm because it would have been pretty cool to go to a football school. Even to still be in the conversation this late in the season is massive, and something to be celebrated. But more than that, this is the chance. There hasn’t been a new national champion since Colorado in 1990, and the last time Stanford had the top pick in the NFL Draft was with John Elway in 1983. For schools like this one, these things don’t come around again very often.

So maybe it’s time to throw caution to the wind. You might never again get the opportunity to believe Stanford has any shot at a national title, so indulge your fantasies while you can. When the defeat comes it will be crushing, but for a few short weeks you’ll be living the dream.

Maybe, just maybe, this could really happen.

Tom Taylor just started watching football, and he is already bracing for “when the defeat comes.” Show your true Stanford fandom by breaking down why the Cardinal will beat Oregon at tom.taylor “at” stanford.edu.