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My first Bowdoin-Colby game was during the 1961-1962 season. I guess you could say I've had a lot of time to reflect on the rivalry. Yet, every year, I start over again. And so, here I am with just four hours to go until game time, and I've stopped working, and have started to shut out the world around me. I hear Bowdoin's President is going to drop the puck tonight. When does the president of such a prestigious educational institution so acknowledge the importance of a D-III hockey game?
This year, my focus on the nature of the rivalry is its compactness. Unlike say Michigan-Ohio State in football, or Notre Dame and any of their so-called rivals (there are about five of them), this game has a more private importance. While it sometimes gets national attention, it matters only to the insiders, the students, alumni, faculty of the two schools, and, perhaps, the residents of Brunswick and Waterville. I'll be watching all alone with my computer plugged into my large, flat-screen TV in Yellow Springs, OH. But alumni groups from each of the schools will be viewing the webcast in venues all over the country, sometimes even together. We realize that we can't have this wonderful thing without each other. On those rare nights that Bowdoin is playing and Colby is not, I find myself rooting for the Polar Bears. We are in this together... We are insiders and, together, tonight and tomorrow night we will shut out the rest of the world and hold our little private party.
Last year, Colby celebrated its bicentennial. Bowdoin has been around a few years longer. I read somewhere that, when Colby was first founded, the trustees didn't know what to pay the faculty. They looked 50 miles to the south and decided, we'll pay them the same as Bowdoin does. And so it started.
Have a good game!
This year, my focus on the nature of the rivalry is its compactness. Unlike say Michigan-Ohio State in football, or Notre Dame and any of their so-called rivals (there are about five of them), this game has a more private importance. While it sometimes gets national attention, it matters only to the insiders, the students, alumni, faculty of the two schools, and, perhaps, the residents of Brunswick and Waterville. I'll be watching all alone with my computer plugged into my large, flat-screen TV in Yellow Springs, OH. But alumni groups from each of the schools will be viewing the webcast in venues all over the country, sometimes even together. We realize that we can't have this wonderful thing without each other. On those rare nights that Bowdoin is playing and Colby is not, I find myself rooting for the Polar Bears. We are in this together... We are insiders and, together, tonight and tomorrow night we will shut out the rest of the world and hold our little private party.
Last year, Colby celebrated its bicentennial. Bowdoin has been around a few years longer. I read somewhere that, when Colby was first founded, the trustees didn't know what to pay the faculty. They looked 50 miles to the south and decided, we'll pay them the same as Bowdoin does. And so it started.
Have a good game!
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