Gorgeous Bennie Babes dotted the SJU campus on Saturday. Where was TDT?
The story du-jour this past week has been the many fans and tailgaters making their way to Collegeville for the 2009 chapter of John Gagliardi’s 61 year career. Never at a loss for the dramatic, Johnnie Football has provided fans with enough entertainment this season alone to replace their collection of Vince Flynn novels.
The latter of course hitting the top of the New York Times best sellers list each fall as he releases a new international anti-terrorist thriller. Unfortunately for Vince, a proud graduate of The University of St. Thomas, and unlike his superhero character Mitch Rapp, UST’s new hero and Coach Glenn Caruso found his first trip to Collegeville a long bus ride home.
In fact with folks trying to leave the Collegeville campus all at once Saturday afternoon, it took nearly as much time to reach the highway 94 exit as it would to reach the west Minneapolis suburbs. Now that’s a painful ride home if you’re 0-2 your first two seasons, losing one on a controversial game ending call and another in overtime.
Not that it was a complete loss for the Tommie fans as plenty of them arrived well before the traffic jam that was still forming at 1:30pm and backed its way into St. Joseph. Those early visitors may have been tipped off late in the week by SCTimes reporter Frank Rajkowski and knew they’d find an inviting atmosphere to relax prior to taking their seats.
While some fans arrived early enough to find frost covering the plastic grass of Clemens Stadium, others grabbed their favorite gathering spot to begin the traditional art of cooking meat over burning coals. On this day the planetary alignment of the college football world was pointing quite obviously toward The Johnnie’s version of Touchdown Jesus – The Abbey Bell Tower and The Collegeville Campus.
Only once before in the long history of Johnnie Football had there been more fans in Collegeville. With bright sunshine, blue skies and two undefeated teams – Saturday’s game defined the big time atmosphere that exists at only a handful of small college campuses and surpasses the environment at just about anything you’ll find in a pretty wide swath through the midsection of Minnesota.
Glenn Caruso said it earlier in the week when he mentioned his goal is to play in 5 or 6 big games every year. Most teams are lucky if they get one or two games of importance in a season and that includes plain ole rivalry games. At St. John’s, one of the great allures of Johnnie Football is the pure rush that comes with 49 yard field goals, the first ever overtime game in home history and real playoff football.
Adding to Saturday’s ideal climate and traditional fall foliage was a dominating defense and punishing ground game that featured two experienced running backs with a combined weight approaching 450 pounds. A load that may well deliver another MIAC Championship and number one seed in the NCAA DIII playoffs.
And as far as our preference in superheroes? We’ll take ours over the NY Times Best Sellers List any day of the week.
Kellen Blaser takes flight as one half of the Johnnies backfield and dynamic duo.