SteveW writes:
>I remember a similar situation a few years back at Matthews Arena.  Lowell
>had made a stirring comeback late in the game when all hell broke loose.
>It was so out-of-control that the officials had to call the game before
>the actual end of regulation.  I remember Jeff Flaherty from Lowell
>actually charged up into the stands to attack a group of Northeastern
>students, and a player from NU (might of been Harry Mews) slugged a
>linesman.
>
>[Mike, were you at this one?]
 
(Nov 18, 1988)
 
Yes, and I remember it pretty vividly.  I recall the fights starting
even before Lowell's 7th goal (Lowell won 7-5) went in the net.
Lowell had just gone ahead 6-5 and as they moved the puck in the
offensive zone, about half of the NU players were taking runs at
anything wearing a blue shirt, and the Lowell players were not backing
down.  By the time the puck entered the net, control had been lost and
there were about 2-3 fights already underway.  Flaherty and Marty Raus
from NU, the two big men, stood toe to toe and went at it for hours,
it seemed.  The benches had cleared and everyone was involved, except
that the only guy not on the ice was a good friend of mine, Mike
Jankowski, who was serving Dave Buda's minor for unsportsmanlike
conduct...Buda got that and then a game misconduct for arguing and had
been tossed after the 6th Lowell goal.
 
It wasn't Mews who was accused of hitting the linesman...it was Peter
Schure, and he received an indefinite suspension that wound up lasting
about a month and a half.  This is what everyone seems to remember
from this event, and I think it is time to set the record straight.
What happened was that an NU player was being double teamed by two
Lowell players, and Schure was 10 feet away but being restrained by a
linesman.  Schure was trying to get away to help his teammate, and in
the course of freeing himself from his jersey (which was where the
linesman was holding him), he struck the linesman - accidentally, I am
convinced.
 
But to this day, people still talk about the time that Schure
"slugged" a linesman in the brawl at Matthews.  In ten years, I am
sure they will say he wound up like Popeye and knocked him into the
fifth row of the balcony. :-)
 
MikeJ had also seen the doubleteaming and was about to leave the box
to help out, but the scoreboard operator reminded him that he'd
probably get a severe suspension for leaving the box, and MJ was
trying to earn a spot on the team then, so he stayed.
 
The game was called with just under 2 minutes left.  An interesting
thing is that Northeastern went up to Maine a week later with half the
NU JV team (Maine fans may remember all the jerseys without names) due
to varsity players being suspended, and only lost 5-4 to the top-ranked
Black Bears.
 
I have never heard this connection made, but this was the first time
Lowell and NU had met since the second game of the 1988 HE Quarterfinals
just eight months earlier.  In that game, there was a semi-brawl as
the teams returned to the ice for the start of the third period - I
recall being down in the locker room as one of the last people to come
out, and hearing a bunch of yelling and the coaching staff rushing out
to get on the ice and get control of their team.  NU went on to win
the series (total goals) 4-3, and I still think the bad blood carried
over to the next season.
 
In the early years of HE, Lowell-NU was one of the fiercest rivalries
there was in college hockey, and I can recall at least 5 separate
Lowell-NU games within a span of three years that got very ugly.  This
was probably because both teams played tough, physical hockey and both
teams had agitators like Tony LoPilato, Rico Rossi, Conrade Thomas and
Harry Mews.  I recall the first time Mews ever played for NU, after
missing the first four games as a freshman due to an injury, and it
was against Lowell.  He had a hat trick and got ejected for fighting
in the third period during a brawl.  Quite a way to break in. :-)
 
Oddly enough, almost exactly a year later, NU was in another ugly
brawl at Merrimack that forced the game to be called with about 3
minutes left and Merrimack leading 8-4.  12 players were suspended for
a total of 31 games as 14 DQs were handed out.  That didn't include
the NU player (to be unnamed) who started it all by spearing
Merrimack's Claude Maillet while Maillet was sitting in the penalty
box, although it did lead to another (to be unnamed) NU player jumping
off the bench and crosschecking Maillet in the head; that player
received the longest suspension from HE, 7 games.
 
In the end, it is certainly better for the game that these incidents
don't tend to happen anymore.  Still, I'm not sure what it means, that
these are some of the things I and others remember most clearly, even
though we agree that they are bad for the game.
---                                                                   ---
Mike Machnik                                            [log in to unmask]
Cabletron Systems, Inc.                                    *HMM* 11/13/93
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