Dom was a bitch and kicked my ass. Well, he had a good week, although not his best, and was definitely beatable. I made sure that didn’t happen, though, with some moves that, in hindsight, rival Isiah Thomas or Rick Pitino in pure stupidity and inneffectiveness. So my summer was wasted. There’s always next year.
Shit.
In fact, this Sunday had been downright very shitty. Tom Brady played one of his worst games as a Patriot and the Panthers won, although if anyone thinks they got retribution for the Super Bowl, they’re going to face a rude awakening tommorow when their ring fingers are empty. Like me. The Sox lost. That wasn’t good. But either way, five-year grace period.
Friday was a much better day. I got to visit four different campuses (yeah, one of them was Suffolk, but still…) and saw some cool stuff. I had to drop off Chad’s sweater at Northeastern, then I went to the Penny Arcade “lecture” at MIT, but I had to leave early after an hour, which was too bad, because they were pretty funny. You’d figure two guys who look as much like total dweebs as them wouldn’t be that funny in person, but I was pleasantly surprised. Okay, maybe I’m the only who’d figure that, but still… I had to leave early because of the main event of the evening. At BU’s Agganis Arena, the Bruins were back.
I was looking forward to hockey this season, but I wasn’t psyched. Then I stepped into the Jack Parker Rink, and there they were. Samsonov, Leetch, Murray, MacEachern, Boynton and Raycroft weren’t there, among others, and the building was only half-full, but I remembered. Good stadium music, like the Doors and Aerosmith, was blasting throughout the arena. Players took passes and rifled them towards the net. I heard the sounds of sticks slapping pucks and pucks pelting boards and plexiglass. I saw a sheet of fresh ice, the purest shade of white out there, and the scoreboard flashing minutae about career minor leaguers. And then, the lights went out. The opening chorus from “O Fortuna” began blaring from the arena, and the scoreboard began showing old photos from the Original 6 years, and immediately cut to clips of Terry O’Reilly pummeling a fan in NY, Cam Neely wailing on some schmo, PJ Stock taking someone down, and my personal-favorite, Neely with blood running down his teeth yelling “fuck you” to the opposing bench. There were clips of Neely deking out Hextall, Bourque blasting a slapshot, Espo raising his number, Bourque taking off the number 7, raising #77 15 years later, Taz and Neely, Bucyk in the head-dress, and every other staple of Bruins lore, ending with Orr himself sailing through the air.
Chills ran down my entire body, and it wasn’t because I was cold. My eyes watered. This is what hockey is all about. Football’s had more memorable encounters. Baseball’s been around longer. Basketball has more stars and legends. But there isn’t a sport fueled by more emotion, more intensity, more will than any other. In many ways, the way the lockout happened with the inflated salaries and all was a joke to begin with; like Simmons said, most of these guys would take $20 an hour to play hockey for a living. It’s the last sport where the atheletes aren’t bigger than the team. Fuck soccer. Hockey is the beautiful game.
