A Bright Pageant, On and Off the Ice

There is a peculiar pageantry to Harvard hockey games.

It begins around game-time on a Friday or Saturday night. You arrive at Bright Center. Crowds are huddled around the ticket booth and a cloud of breath hangs above them in the cold air.

You walk up the stairs past the crowds and give your ticket to the man at the door. Maybe you buy a program from one of the four people--field hockey players during the fall--who sell them at the entrance. You find your seat.

And you notice it's cold. Almost as cold as outside.

If you get to Bright early enough, you can watch the teams warm up. The big guns, the show-offs on each team, smash hard shots at the goalie and then turn to face the small, early-arriving crowd. Smiling.

Before the game, the Zamboni clears the ice. There's something pure about clean ice. And it seems like an act of desecration when the referees pounce onto it just before the game begins and skate around, carving up the smooth surface.

The teams come out soon after and loosen up. Some players stretch their legs on the sides of the boards. The goalies skate to the nets and slash up the ice in front of them. Getting comfortable. Finding a rhythm.

The band--a noisy bunch in Crimson jackets--plays the national anthem, the players stand at attention, facing the flag, the crowd stands, you stand. When it is over the crowd cheers, you cheer. The centers square off at center ice, the puck is dropped, and the crowd roars again.

Hockey is a game of poetry and brutality. There is the precision of passes and the crushing vengeance of players smashing each other against the glass. Hockey is a blend of baseball and football, soccer and the Ice Capades.

Harvard hockey is fast. Forwards don't get trapped often in the corners but cruise down the center of the ice, flicking passes back and forth. Precision. Pretty.

You recognize the Harvard players not by their faces--because beneath the glass facemasks, you can barely make out their features--but by the names on the backs of their jerseys. And by their styles.

Forward Lane MacDonald, the least heralded member of last year's potent Firing Line, is steady and smooth. He skates slickly past opposing defensemen, ripping shots from all angles. Sometimes the shots soar past the bemused goalie and into the net. Sometimes the crowd--and his coach--don't know how he does it.

Center Allen Bourbeau, who is listed at 5-ft., 10-in., but seems shorter, is Scott Fusco's heir apparent to the Crimson scoring title. Sometimes he gets his goals the easy way--by stepping in front of the opposing net, picking up a loose puck and flinging it home.

More often, though, he gets his goals the hard way--by slashing a shot from the side or by taking the puck the length of the ice, faking out the goalie and sending it past him. And Bourbeau isn't afraid to dive into the corners and tassle with a big defenseman in pursuit of a loose puck.

On the power play, defensemen Randy Taylor and Mark Benning show polish on the point. The second defensive pair--Don Sweeney and Josh Caplan--is noted for its speed.

Chris Biotti, another defenseman, is just big. He's 6-ft., 2-in. and weighs 200 lbs. He has an aura of his own because he was drafted in the first round of the NHL draft by the Calgary Flames. He's a pro, and he's playing for Harvard.

The crowd, too, has a personality. It is noisy and mean. It delights in opposing teams' mishaps and scorns all opposing goalies.

Last year, Doug Dadswell, a former Cornell goalie now playing in the Flames' minor league system, got the familiar, "Sieve, sieve" chants howled at him.

He also heard this taunt: "We know your dad's well, but how's your mother?"

And someone added, crudely, "Is she a sieve, too?"

Big Al, the guy with the colorful Air Jordan clothes and sun glasses who stands behind the goal on the far end of the rink during every home game, comes with signs which he holds up periodically. They all have messages--most of them funny.

When the Crimson plays Colgate, Al holds up signs that say, "Brush Your Team With Colgate"

Against Cornell, his sign reads, "Better Dead Than Red."

When the crowd is cheering and ranting, Bright isn't so cold. You're not so cold. You like it. Yes, you like it.

And when it's over, and you've stepped back into the cold night, you realize you haven't been to a mere hockey game. You've been to a pageant.