24 September ’99
Saladbarring the Freshmen
They have it easy this year.

1 October ’99
An Empty Shell
HC football leaves home.

12 November ’99
Living in Fear & Tyranny
Joey tastes the WoPo's wrath.

19 November ’99
From D.C. to S.G.A.
Is Clinton headed to HC?

28 January ’00
Snow Problem
News flash: it's winter.

4 February ’00
Scary Life on the Hill
Spooked by Mulledy, I-290.

18 February ’00
Dead Presidents
Where's the long weekend?

25 February ’00
Razzies Hit Rock-Bottom
J. Brocklesby, film critic.

3 March ’00
College is Hall
It's a big-[expletive] building.

24 March ’00
The Quorum Question
New SGA Constitution has flaws.

7 April ’00
False Alarms
Sirens interrupt Kimball 'meal.'

14 April ’00
Features Farewell
Crusader star writers graduate.

Football, that great Holy Cross event which has defined our September Saturdays, is gone.

Fitton Field will be an empty shell come 1:00 tomorrow. The Crusader squad that bowed to Harvard last week, yet trounced Lafayette the week before, will be in Maryland. And the question of the hour is, "now what?"

This is a conundrum which preoccupies newcomers such as Joey Brocklesby '03, who has become enamored of the legend and pageantry of the purple pigskin players. "I never miss a game," said the freshman, who actually has been to all three home games. "I was going to fly out to Towson this weekend until I remembered I have that big history test on Monday." It's good to put first priorities first.

Joey, like so many men-and-women-for-others, will feel a vacuum in his heart this weekend when he thinks of Fitton Field's eastern 35-yard line. "I like to sit at the 35," he said, "because it's right next to the band. Without the band, football's just a game." Joey's an obedient Crusader who sings along with the Alma Mater ("O Christmas Tree") and always gives another hoiah, sometimes two. Throughout the month of September he's been humming "Mr. Touchdown U.S.A." and "R-E-S-P-E-C-T." Joey has also tried, poorly, to imitate the sound that the band makes when the ball's flying after a kickoff. Now he's going through Marching Band Withdrawal and it's not a pretty sight.

What makes this weekend's football hiatus so much harder to bear, of course, is the fact that last week's game ended in a disappointing fashion: the Crimson pride came back from an early deficit for a 25-17 win over our boys. What's worse, the entire sordid spectacle was overseen by a full Harvard propaganda machine, with cheerleaders, remote broadcasters, and a marching band in attendance. Your loyal correspondent, on hand to witness this Homecoming episode of Chu-Chu Rah-Rah, noticed that:

1. The Harvard radio commentators were wearing ties;
2. The Harvard marching band was wearing ties and jackets;
3. The Harvard cheerleaders, who had signs marked "DEFENSE" and "H-A-R-V-A-R-D," in case you couldn't figure out whom they were rooting for, were not wearing ties.

Coincidence? I think not. Presented with these data, Joey began singing the theme song to "Hawaii Five-O" and had to be sent back to Hanselman. Deprived of my young friend's incisive wit (not to mention his perfect tenor voice) and forced to eat lunch with a motley assortment of sophomores and juniors, I struck up a conversation with a few Holy Cross Good Time Marching Band members. The topic came around to the last week's halftime show.

Harvard, in an attempt to prove their cultural and academic superiority, labeled the Holy Cross community as an impure mixture of Yale blue and Cornell red, and identified us as (credit due to the Worcester Telegram & Gazette) "bush lovers," stating that our penalty for raising a ruckus on Caro Street was to forever live in Worcester. As one Good Time Marcher put it, "their attempts at highbrow humor hit below the belt." The Harvard Nobody Expects the Spanish Inquisition Marching Band, complete with nifty red suits, played songs on the field while standing still and listening to their own amplified cheesy jokes.

Our squad, which has mastered the skill of trumpeting and walking at the same time, did not burden its audience with attempts at pompous sophomoric banter. My source on the field noted that the Inquisition Band also seemed to be "[having] a problem marching in step."

The Cambridge kids earned justification for their snootiness by dominating the second half of play and filed into their chartered buses with a 2-0 record and a 10-0 ego. They will go on to insult other schools' halftimes and annoy quality humorists throughout the Northeast (I think that the low caliber of their halftime narrative should disqualify them from using alumnus Tom Lehrer's classic "Fight Fiercely, Harvard" in their band repertoire. It's just not right.). The cheerleaders and their visual aids will spell out cheers for other literate audiences.

Football will return to Mount St. James next weekend, when we host the Bulldogs of Yale (according to the Crimson, half of our hue heritage). On that day we shall see the return of the marching band and, one should hope, some semblance of order to gridiron-crazy Crusaders' lives. Joey will be right there on the 35-yard line with me and the band. And as always, critiquing the rival band is not just permitted, it's strongly encouraged.

This article ran in the 1 October 1999 edition of The Crusader, on page 13 (third page of Features section), above the continuation of Mike Terlizzi's column, which was apparently being written by Chris Coleman that week.