Pot-Luck For B.C.

"It's a game you just don't want to lose because it's so significant."--Boston College Coach Len Ceglarski.

No, Ceglarski--the winningest coach in the history of college hockey--is not referring to the NCAA Championship game. He's talking about the Beanpot. And not the Beanpot final, either, but the consolation game. A game about 32 people who got lost on a sightseeing tour of North Station attended Monday evening.

Monday, Boston Garden looked like the set of The Phantom of the Opera. Boston College and Harvard players were a bunch of crazed fiddlers, running around in an empty auditorium, desperately searching for their scores.

Significant?

The Boston Globe devoted three paragraphs to the game. Press row looked like a stink bomb had fallen on it.

Significant?

The Harvard band played extended versions of "Only the Good Die Young" and "Psycho Killer" to keep itself awake. For lack of anything better to do, people actually listened.

Yet here's Ceglarski calling this game--which had as much excitement as watching a supermarket line move--"significant."

Had the great coach been hit once too often by a stray puck?

On the contrary. Ceglarski took a look at his calendar and noticed his league, Hockey East, is holding playoffs in three weeks. His team is in sixth place in the league. Only six teams make the Hockey East playoffs.

Momentum

Ceglarski has a young team, a team that has lost more than it has won, a team that needed something to put the bloom back in its cheeks. B.C.'s 4-2 win over Harvard--nationally-ranked Harvard--gave the Eagles a shade, if only a pale shade, of momentum going into the fight for the last playoff spot.

"We really wanted to beat this team," B.C. Co-Captain Dan Shea said. "We wanted a confidence builder. We want to keep on a roll for the playoffs."

A victory over Harvard, even a lethargic Harvard, gives teams hope of future success. Sometimes, though, it produces delusions of gradeur.

Said the Co-Captain of the 9-14-2 Eagles: "We can play with anybody."