It was probably the first time in history that Harvard University hockey legend Billy Cleary had ever been booed during a Beanpot.
But midway through the first period of Monday night’s semifinal between Boston University and Harvard, as a black-and-white video clip remembering Cleary’s 1955 MVP-winning Beanpot performance played on the FleetCenter JumboTron, BU’s fans let out a collective jeer.
Forget the fact that Cleary single-handedly was the Beanpot in 1955, scoring four goals in one period against Northeastern University and 11 points in the entire tournament. Forget Cleary’s 12 points in the 1960 Olympics that led the U.S. hockey team past the Soviets for the gold medal.
This is hockey. The Beanpot. The most important annual college hockey event in these parts until Tournament Time. Mother Theresa could walk onto the ice dressed in a yellow Boston College SuperFan T-shirt, and Terrier Nation would dish out the same treatment.
It’s nothing personal. It’s just what makes the Battle of Boston so important for the 17,565 fans that annually turn the FleetCenter into a competition over who can coin the most creative chant.
Leading the way Monday night for BU was freshman Jonathan Goldberg, standing atop the FleetCenter balcony with his BU jersey and his face painted half-scarlet, half-white.
‘When we chant, we scream,’ he says.
To these fans, the battle over which school’s supporters are rowdiest is practically as important as who wins the game. Victory isn’t just about watching student athletes hoist a 23-pound pot of beans over their heads it’s about exclusive one-year bragging rights and all the pride that comes with chanting ‘Where’s your Beanpot?’ the next time the schools meet.
‘We’re smashed into the same arena as all four Boston schools. … It gets really intense,’ Goldberg says.
And for all the college hockey fans at the Beanpot Monday night, there was plenty of material.
‘There are certain characteristics of all four schools us included that can be totally ragged on,’ Goldberg says. ‘For example, Northeastern’s five-year plan, Harvard’s band wearing suits, Boston College just sucking.’
Goldberg is a specialist not just in chanting but in heckling.
‘When it’s silent, I’ll scream at the Northeastern fans, ‘Shut up. You go to Northeastern. You are retarded,” he says. ‘I like chanting at their remedial education.’
Northeastern fans, regarded as some of the rowdiest in Hockey East, hold a similar hatred for their cross-town neighbors.
‘At the BU games, we have a Terrier actually, and we hang it from a rope and swing it around,’ says Steven Ferrara, a Northeastern freshman with his face painted red and black. ‘We always do some crazy stuff to stand out.’
Worsening the hatred between both schools’ fans is the reality that the Terriers have captured seven of the last eight Beanpot titles, while the Huskies have been shut out since 1988.
‘I just don’t like BU,’ Ferrara said. ‘There’s something about them the way they carry themselves.’
Ferrara’s friend, Northeastern freshman Rick Therrien despises the Huskies’ Beanpot opponents so much that he’s found a way to make money from it. Therrien designed and printed ‘BC Sucks’ shirts and has sold 40 of them to his fellow Husky fans for $10 apiece.
‘We actually went to some BU games and sold them to the BU fans as well,’ Therrien says. ‘Then we printed up some ‘BU Sucks’ stickers and sold them to the BC kids.’
The school perhaps least hated in the rivalry lies across the river. The number of jersey-wearing Harvard fans has diminished since the Crimson’s win of the first-ever ‘Pot in 1952, a 7-4 victory over the Terriers. Still, the Beanpot brings out a different side of everyone, and even Harvard’s fans spout out some very un-Harvard-like language when the puck is on the ice.
‘Northeastern sucks. I’m gonna lay that out right now,’ says James Dollinger-McElligott, a member of the Harvard pep band and presumably not an English major. ‘We don’t like BU very much, but BC has always been pretty strong. But we hate BU, too.’
The Crimson had reason to feel down, especially after dropping Monday night’s opener, 2-1, to BU.
Emotions were completely different for the school that Terrier fans have nicknamed ‘Newton College.’ Eagle hockey fans, hoping to bring the Beanpot back to Chestnut Hill after relinquishing it to the Terriers last year, have developed their own methods to promote the team.
Five years ago, two BC students created gold ‘SuperFan’ T-shirts for fans to wear during a football game against Virginia Tech. The movement spilled over to the university’s other sports, and SuperFans (basically any BC supporter who wears gold during a game and cheers for the Eagles) have flourished ever since.
Tim Czerwienski, a BC freshman in his first year of SuperFanhood, bought season tickets for the Eagles’ hockey season this year. Already, he’s become a guru of college hockey chanting.
One of his favorites?
‘We’ve got football’ the chant that mocks BU’s decision to cut its football program in 1997.
‘That’s one that really gets to the heart of the matter,’ Czerwienski said. ‘I’m sure that offends plenty of people.’
In the middle of the first period Monday night, with a pack of Northeastern fans two sections away, one of the first shouting matches of the ’03 Beanpot ensued. Husky fans taunted Terrier Nation with a chant of ‘S.A.T scores.’ The Terriers came back with ‘Where’s your Beanpot?’ Northeastern countered with ‘Where’s your football?’
But the Terriers had one of the best lines of the night:
‘Where’s your hockey?’
The Husky fans fell silent. Terrier Nation had just racked up a small victory.
‘If you can get a laugh from the crowd, great,’ says Goldberg, the loud-mouthed BU fan leading the Terrier chants from the bleachers.
During one of the intermissions, BU mascot Rhett skated onto the FleetCenter ice holding a cardboard replica of the Beanpot. The BU crowd loved it and started chanting, ‘Where’s your mascot?’ to a mascot-free Harvard contingent.
‘When you’ve got everyone cheering and screaming in unison, it’s deafening,’ Goldberg says. ‘And then there’s an eerie silence at the end that gives you chills.’
It’s as much a part of the Beanpot tradition as Boston accents and rowdy rides home on the Green Line after a big win.
‘[The players] have made my freshman year,’ Goldberg says. ‘So I’m doing everything I can to give it back the face-painting, the volume of the cheers. I just love BU hockey.’