A Chicago weekend calls

Will someone please allow me to live vicariously through them?

There's a potential sports road trip out there that is so perfect, yet so perfectly impossible for me to go on for a variety of reasons. We've been bantering about this potential trip in the office for months.

Done correctly, you could make this sports trip while missing just one day of a Monday-Friday job. Someone — better yet, a bunch of you — please consider this, if everything works out:

• The game: Gophers at Illinois, 11 a.m. Saturday, Oct. 29, Champaign, Ill.

• The lowdown: This is the start of your journey — either via a flight into Chicago and a two-hour drive (which could be done Saturday morning, technically) or via a seven-plus-hour drive from Minneapolis (which would be best to at least start Friday night).

It's the homecoming game for the Illini, but it's also a very winnable game for the Gophers. Someday you could say you were at the game that helped Minnesota become bowl-eligible.

• Cost: Flights are less than $100 into Chicago if you go in Saturday morning and come back at the crack of dawn Tuesday (more on that in a minute). Actual game tickets are as low as $6 on StubHub.com.

• The game: World Series Game 5. Sunday, Oct. 30, Chicago.

• The lowdown: If the Cubs make it to the World Series, we already know that they will be scheduled to host Games 3, 4 and 5 on Oct. 28, 29 and 30 because the National League lost the All-Star Game.

• Cost: An arm. And a leg. And a service fee on top of that. But even if you aren't willing to fork over the cash for a ticket to the game, just being in Chicago when the Cubs were in the World Series (and could potentially clinch) would be amazing.

• Potential problem: Well, first the Cubs have to get to the World Series. Also, Game 5 is only necessary if there's no sweep. (However, you could also head to Chicago after the Gophers/Illinois game and probably be there in time for Game 4 Saturday night.)

• The game: Vikings at Bears, 7:30 p.m. Monday, Oct. 31, Soldier Field in Chicago.

• Cost: You can easily get in the door for less than $100 and find a very good seat for less than $200. That's not cheap, but you've come this far.

• Potential problem: Chances are you'll be running on fumes and adrenaline at this point — and possibly staring at an all-night drive or early Tuesday flight home to make it back to work. Do you have what it takes to finish the trip with a flourish?