PART II: AND NEVER THE TWO SHALL MEET? Thursday night back at the Radisson after BU's win over Minnesota, several of us met up with some of the BU folks on their half of the first floor, when we were joined by Maine coach Shawn Walsh. For my money, this was one of the more memorable moments of the weekend. Coach Walsh spent close to two hours standing around talking hockey with everyone (about 15 people), many of them BU fans. In his post to HOCKEY-L a couple of months ago, he talked about how he considered himself a fan of the game like everyone else, and all this was was a bunch of people talking about the game. Some folks picked his brain for some of his insights on the upcoming final and the next season, and he seemed genuinely interested to hear what people thought about issues concerning the game like the shootout. He spent some time talking about some of the more outstanding players in the league as well, such as Lowell's Shane Henry. Also, he finally got his chance to meet the ex-Ogre, Tony Biscardi. I think Tony got a kick out of Coach Walsh saying that after he witnessed Sasquatch, I believe, doing his thing at the last BU-Maine game, he was "sure that was Tony!" Then he caught a glimpse of Tony in the stands Thursday night, "waving that towel," and he said he wished he could get Tony to come to Maine because they could use someone like him. Tony took that as a huge compliment. The BU folks had cooked up some concoction called Jungle Juice and graciously offered a glass to Coach Walsh, but he (wisely) declined. Then, noticing our own Sid Whitaker carrying a glass, he turned and said, "Sid, I don't want any more of that stuff going down your throat! I'll call 'BZ...50 thousand watts and your career's done!" That's my Quote of the Weekend. It got a huge roar and I think Sid (who gave permission to post this) turned red enough that you could have painted STOP on his face in huge white letters. Sid deserves some mention here, by the way. A budding journalist, Sid was able to convince the station he works for, WBZ-1030AM (one of the largest stations in Boston and the country), to allow him to do daily reports from the final four along with interviews. That's some great exposure, and with all the talk here about getting college hockey more press, no one can say Sid has not done his part. No one was immune from Coach Walsh's ribbing. At one point, he looked around and said, "You know, it's too bad John Haeussler isn't here." Then he added, "What a frontrunner! Michigan gets knocked out...and where is he?" :-) When I was pressed for my final four next year, I started out with, "Well, Merrimack..." and then was quickly shouted down. :-) Then I sidestepped the question (some would say wimpishly) by pointing out that I would never make such a prediction without knowing the seedings. For example, if BU and LSSU were paired in an early round game... As I was saying at the beginning of Part 1, this was what I thought the whole event was really about. For one thing, here you had a coach and fans having a rare occasion to hang out and enjoy talking about hockey. And on top of that, with the way Maine and BU have become such bitter rivals over the last few years (just read some of the posts from earlier this season), it was really remarkable that BU fans and Maine's head coach could talk amicably and joke with each other about various things. I have to think that both sides came away with a better understanding of the other. After all, they're not really that different. Some of the BU fans could have easily gone to Maine (heck, Sid started there), and Walsh could have ended up somewhere else. And many of the Maine players who BU fans despise could have been wearing scarlet and white instead. I am sure next year the rivalry will be just as intense, but I wonder whether people who were there for those two hours will still have that moment in the back of their minds along with the thought that hey, he isn't that different from us. Unfortunately, we arrived down on the first floor too late Saturday night after the final to have missed a wiffle ball game which I think involved both BU and LSSU fans. Security had broken it up just before Coach Walsh came to bat, I believe. The guy who was the pitcher joked that it was too bad, because he was going to bean him. :-) --- --- Mike Machnik [log in to unmask] Cabletron Systems, Inc. *HMM* 11/13/93