Forever second fiddle
Colleges always trail pro passion in Hub
Ted Sarandis, who used to hold down the nighttime fort at WEEI, was famous for going on epic rants in which he’d posit that Boston is not a “real” sports town.
The grounds for this outrageous charge? We couldn’t bring ourselves to embrace college sports, particularly men’s basketball, and in Ted’s view that negated all the passion we show for the Bruins, Celtics, Patriots and Red Sox.
Sarandis also served as the play-by-play barker for Boston College hoops, and he always dreamed of the day the Eagles would own our hearts and control our brains the way basketball powerhouses in Durham, Louisville and Storrs do.
Alas, we’re not there yet. Our four big-league teams routinely play to packed houses, whereas the many college programs in our midst bring to mind the old joke about the guy who calls the ticket office of a struggling, unpopular team and says he’s thinking of bringing his family to tonight’s game and wants to know what time it starts. To which the person on the other end of the line responds, “What time can you get here?” Which brings us to this year’s
NCAA Division 1 men’s basketball tournament, otherwise known as March Madness. The circus is coming to Boston, with two Sweet Sixteen matchups in the East Region on tap for Friday night at the Garden. The winners of the Villanova-West Virginia and Purdue-Texas Tech showdowns will meet on Sunday, with the East champ moving on to San Antonio for the Final Four.
You wouldn’t think that any road to San Antonio would run through Boston, but then you wouldn’t be thinking about March Madness. And make no mistake: The Garden will be filled for the three tourney tilts, and it will be loud.
Causeway Street will be alive with proud fans of the Wildcats, Boilermakers, Mountaineers and Red Raiders. We’ll be awaiting news as to which restaurant gets a visit from celebrity West Virginia coach Bob Huggins, and it’ll be a full five-alarm alert if Texas Tech alum Wes Welker shows up at the Garden.
Just don’t expect people around here to be clutching their pearls over the actual games. Oh, to be sure, plenty of local fans will make their way to the Garden, and for very good reason: The four teams are among the very best in the nation, and there are thousands of sports connoisseurs in our midst who appreciate high-level competitive athletics. To these people, it’s not just sports; it’s art. Beautiful art.
But — and, Lord, how many times have we been over this? — there have been only two occasions over the last 50 years when fans in the Boston sports market have gone head-over-heels, pinch-me-I’m-dreaming, stop-the-presses ga-ga over a college program.
Let us be brief:
• The 1984 Boston College football team, led by locally-grown Heisman Trophy winner Doug Flutie, rolled to a 10-2 record, culminating with a 45-28 victory over Houston in the Cotton Bowl. Flutie’s Hail Mary to Gerard Phelan for a game-winning touchdown against Miami at the Orange Bowl on the day after Thanksgiving remains one of the singular moments in Boston sports history.
• The 1995-96 UMass men’s basketball team rolled through the regular season, emerged as a No.1 seed in the NCAA Tournament and made it to the Final Four before losing in the semifinal round to Rick Pitino’s Kentucky Wildcats. The backcourt tandem of Edgar Padilla and Carmelo Travieso was deemed the nation’s best by Dick Vitale, and Marcus Camby continued his ascendency to elite status. He went into the NBA draft at the end of the season and was selected second overall by the Toronto Raptors. Coach John Calipari headed off to the New Jersey Nets for a failed stab at running an NBA team.
We all went nuts over those two teams. (And no emails about the NCAA dog-sniffers stepping in, and how UMass’ trip to the Final Four “never happened.” At the time it was happening . . . it happened.)
We did go nuts over several very good BC football and basketball seasons. This includes the 2007 BC football team which, led by future NFL star Matt Ryan, went 113. Nope, didn’t go nuts.
Yes, BU and BC have won national championships in men’s hockey, and they won our respect. But we didn’t go, you know, nuts.
And here we are, again. Our Four Basic Sports Food Groups — Bruins, Celtics, Patriots, Red Sox — have combined for 10 championships this century. The players on those teams are local celebrities. But the college programs remain in a sort of permanent outer hall, unable to get into the main room, and that’s just the way it is.
Sorry, Ted.