PROVIDENCE, R.I. – Friday night at Providence College’s Schneider Arena, Peter Zancanaro wore a Providence College sweater and a Boston University hat. Next to him, his wife Leslie was wrapped in a BU scarf – which, if you looked closely, was complemented nicely by her PC gloves.
With a hockey game between PC and BU about to begin behind them, the Zancanaros appeared to be a confused couple. Who in their right minds would fly all the way from Michigan and not even know which team to cheer for?
“You’re saying, ‘Oh, I hope something happens for BU,’ and then you say, ‘Well I can’t say that. I hope something happens for Providence,'” Peter says. “So it’s kind of back and forth.”
Back and forth. Such has been the life of the Zancanaros’ twin boys, Brad and Tony. Brad plays for BU. Tony plays for PC. Brad makes a charge at Tony on the ice. Tony throws Brad through a wall at home. Back and forth.
“Always kicking the [crap] out of each other,” Peter says of the brothers.
Needless to say, the Zancanaros didn’t have any more kids. “Are you kidding me? That was it, man,” he says.
Leslie pipes in. “I’d just take a hockey stick and slap them apart. That’s the only way I could get near it.”
Friday night, it was lucky that Brad and Tony didn’t have to share the ice too much, because no one was letting a stick-wielding Mom out on the ice during a key Hockey East match-up between the first-place Friars and the talented Terriers.
Until they got to college, Brad and Tony never had this problem of playing hockey against each other. Now, playing in the same league, both Zancanaros are captains. Both are centers. And both look – and play – almost exactly the same.
“I think they’re a little bit different,” Peter says of their hockey abilities.
But how? He reconsiders, smiling. “I can’t say.”
Mom doesn’t need a reason. “They’re completely different,” she says. “To me, they are.”
SHORT STORIES
Either Zancanaro is quite a sight to behold on the ice. On the same roster as 6-foot, 7-inch Tom Morrow, BU officially lists Brad at 5-feet, 5-inches. PC has Tony at 5-foot-6. But they are exactly the same height, and either of those figures probably involves ice skates and a faulty tape measure. As John Laliberte, Brad’s linemate at BU, respectfully puts it: they’re “midgets.”
“Am I really 5-7?” Peter asks, laughing. He’s not. He might have an inch or two on his sons, but that leaves him at no more than 5-foot-5 himself. Leslie looks to be about 5-feet, 4-inches – in heels. For this family, it’s never been such a bad thing.
“You know what, they just never let it bother ’em,” Peter says. “It’s more other people that worry about that more than them. They really don’t worry about it. In fact, in some cases, it’s an advantage.
“Their center of gravity’s lower. They try and use it to their advantage versus thinking of it as a disadvantage.”
Opposing players might agree. When playing defense, each Zancanaro resembles a wasp that you can’t get rid of, no matter how hard you try. Both are so muscularly toned and firm that they seem almost immovable. You can whack at them, but they don’t go anywhere. Sometimes they sting, swooping in unexpectedly and swiping the puck from a startled forward. If they miss, they always seem to have enough energy to come back and give it another run.
“They’re both exactly the same in their grit and their willingness to take care of defense,” says Brad’s coach at BU, Jack Parker – a twin himself. “And also, they make their linemates good. They really help their linemates out. I think they’re very, very, very, very similar that way.”
Brad shoots right-handed. Tony shoots left-handed. Other than that – and their uniforms – you have to wait until they open their mouths before you can tell them apart.
“[Tony]’s always yelling and screaming,” Laliberte says. “Brad’s a lot quieter. Sometimes I gotta tell him to yell at me to give him a pass. Tony I don’t think has that problem. He’s kind of a loudmouth out there, chirping.”
But what is there to say?
“I call him short,” Tony says about his brother.
“One time, Tony said to Brad, ‘My father slept with your mother,'” Peter says. “I don’t know if you can publish that.”
Leslie cuts in. “They’re not allowed to talk about their mother.”
But they do – or at least Tony does. But it hasn’t always been that way.
“Twins flip-flop personalities,” Peter says. “There was times when they were younger when they were flip-flopped – their personalities. But I would say that Tony does more talking.”
What have never flip-flopped are their appearances, simply because they’ve always looked exactly the same. Both have shortly cropped hair that’s not quite brown, but certainly not dirty blonde. Both have big, humble eyes, and – like their dad – a nose that slightly curves down to its tip. Tony, Brad and Peter have all broken their wrists in recent years, too – Peter from hockey (he still plays three times a week), Tony from roller hockey and Brad from wrestling.
Their parents can tell them apart, but they’re just about the only ones. There was the time when, outside BU’s Agganis Arena, someone stopped Tony to tell him what a great game he had played although he had only watched. The parents – who fly out from their native Trenton, Mich. (in suburban Detroit) almost every other weekend to see their sons play – say it’s routine for fans to do a double-take when they see one of the sons in the stands at the other’s game.
But it’s not just fans who can’t tell them apart.
“I’ll never forget,” Parker remembers, “when we came down to play Providence Brad’s freshman year, and I went up to see [then-PC coach] Paul Pooley – I always go see the opposing coach before the game starts – and I go up to his office and we just got off the bus, and I looked, and I said, ‘What the hell are you doing here?’ to Brad Zancanaro. ‘What are you doing in this office?’ And it was Tony. They were recruiting him, and it was his weekend. ‘I’m not Brad, Coach.’ OK.”
RENEWING THEIR RIVALRY
On June 4, 1982, Tony was born first, with Brad not far behind. But Parker’s exchange took place because Brad headed off to college a year earlier than Tony. The older twin played an extra year of junior hockey, but when he was ready to go to college, BU wasn’t really an option anyway.
“We talked to him a little bit, but we thought we were getting a little too small, to tell you the truth,” Parker says.
Tony wasn’t offended.
“I think we needed to establish our own identities,” Tony says, even though they’ve always been best friends. “We were always known as the twins, or together, so I think it was good that we went to school separate places.”
But they both came to New England, which isn’t all that common for those who grew up in the shadow of Hockeytown. But Peter says it was back when they were 10 that they both knew they were set on heading East for college.
“We had to work real hard when they were young on their skating,” Peter says. So he took them to skating guru Laura Stamm’s program in Connecticut. “We took a tour of Boston at the time, and that’s when they kind of fell in love with the East Coast. Ever since then, they always wanted to play out in Boston somewhere.”
Even then, the twins’ parents couldn’t have predicted they would both go on to become captains in the best collegiate hockey conference in the East – something not handed out lightly, but only to the most mature and selfless players in the bunch.
“We’re very proud of that, especially at such prestigious universities like Providence College and Boston University,” Peter Zancanaro says. “It’s a huge honor.”
Brad does his leading by example. When speaking to the media, there’s sometimes a slight quiver in his voice. When on the ice, there is no such hesitation.
“Tony’s a little bit more intense,” Leslie says.
On the score sheet, Brad’s made more of an impact. In his first two years, he notched 31 points. Tony only had 20 going into his junior season.
“I was more defensive the last two years, but I’m starting to play like him a little more, you know, offensively, creating scoring chances,” Tony says.
Brad has experienced a few memorable goals – he scored the last goal at BU’s old Walter Brown Arena and the first at the brand-new Agganis Arena. He also ducked past a falling Boston College defenseman and whipped one in to give Parker – a legend at BU – his 700th career win last December.
Against each other, though, it’s often a stalemate. They’ve faced off 10 times now, counting Friday night. Brad has one goal – BU’s first in a 3-2 win last October. Tony has none.
“I think sometimes [Brad]’s gotten a little unfocused because he wants to do well against his brother,” Parker said.
A GLIMPSE OF THE GAME
Meanwhile, the Zancanaro parents aren’t sure what to think. Before the game, they are swarmed by TV cameras, tape recorders and parents from both teams cracking jokes they’ve probably heard a thousand times. Leslie rolls her eyes at the whole thing.
“It happens once a year,” she says.
But this year is even crazier, since both Zancanaros are captains. And the parents know how rare their sons’ feat is.
“I was wondering what all the big deal was,” Brad says.
Usually, when they come out East, they are sure to catch one of each son’s games. It’s easier when they play each other, at least in terms of convenience. Not in terms of nerves.
Once they find a seat (“We like to move around,” Leslie says.), it’s silence. Don’t try talking to Peter during the game – he’s too busy talking to Tony and Brad (“C’mon, hit him.”).
Leslie’s a little calmer – but not always. During the teams’ three-game playoff series last March, she “hid in a corner the whole time.”
But during the first period Friday, she’s OK to watch. It helps that Providence coach Tim Army put Tony on the second line, while Parker put Brad on BU’s first trio. That means the pair rarely sees ice time at the same exact moment, except for a few instances on one of the teams’ power plays. It also means no altercations between them.
Since they are both forwards, Leslie has a simple philosophy.
“Whoever’s end the puck’s in, that’s who I cheer for,” she says.
It doesn’t always work, though. In the first period, one of Providence’s forwards spins free of Brad, despite Peter’s urges to “stay with him.” The play results in an easy Friar goal after BU’s goalie is unable to cover up the rebound. Tony’s team is ahead, but Peter’s shaking his head.
But by the third, things have come full circle. Providence had taken a 2-0 lead, but two late BU goals tie the game at 2-2, even amid chants of “TO-ny’s BET-ter.” As overtime starts, Leslie is again nowhere to be seen. Must be back to the corner.
As the final seconds tick off, she comes out of hiding with a sigh of relief. An all-too-perfect tie. A pleasant Saturday ahead as a family in Providence.
“My parents are happy,” Brad says, his voice dripping with frustration. “Tony and I aren’t.”