They tore down the Beaver Stadium pressbox Saturday morning (as shown in this video shot by Lions247 editor Mark Brennan), at least 25 years after they should have done so. And one of the better tales involving that rickety old structure was related to me several years ago by Mike Gross, my co-host on the “After the Buzzer” podcast.
(Related, I might add, and repeated several times since then, by both of us.)
The way the story goes, Penn State hosted Notre Dame on a broiling hot September day in 2007. (The Nits’ 31-10 victory was, in fact, the most recent meeting between the teams, which will square off in a national semifinal Thursday, in the Orange Bowl.) The pressbox was especially oppressive, leading one scribe to dash off a letter to Tim Curley, then the athletic director.
The night before PSU’s next road game, there was an off-the-record session involving Joe Paterno and the media corps, as was customary in those days. It would be held in the hotel room of Jeff Nelson, then the sports information director.
The way Mike tells it, Paterno came bursting in the door, and in a loud, mocking tone said, “THE POOR SPORTSWRITERS ARE HOT.” He continued on for a while in his nasally voice, one that forever betrayed his Brooklyn roots and has inspired a million impressions over the years. That led to chuckles all around that particular night, but eventually he did admit that they needed to do something about the box, most of which dates back to 1924, when it was part of Beaver Field.
And now they’re going to. Long after the shame of the Sandusky scandal. Long after Paterno’s death and the accompanying debates regarding his legacy. Long after the program and indeed college football in general underwent major upheaval.
(Also long after I last worked there. I did two tours on the PSU beat, from 1984 to 2003 and 2011-17. That, you can be sure, involves a lot of time on Route 322, behind RVs sporting “409” bumper stickers.)
According to Statecollege.com, the box was disassembled with the rest of Beaver Field and moved across campus in 1959. The box was expanded in 1980, and given some occasional facelifts over the years. But it was widely viewed as the worst in the Big Ten, in that it was a cramped structure ill suited to house PSU’s massive media corps, much less those who came in from elsewhere around the conference.
You will no doubt be happy to know that the poor sportswriters managed. (We are such gamers.) And now that this structure has met its demise, I agree wholeheartedly with something that Rich Scarcella of the Reading Eagle said in his remarks to the assembled scribes before the final regular-season game – that the space might not have been all that special, but the people made it so.
Hey, you work in tight quarters like that, and you’re bound to get to know someone, right?
So here’s to Rich and Mike, who I’ve known forever and continue to do great work. And here’s to the aforementioned Mr. Brennan, who occupied the seat next to mine for a time and somehow took amazing game photos from way up there. (He also thought that in a tight spot, the Lions should always, always, always dial up a screen pass.) And here’s to Sean Fitz, now publisher of PennStateon3, who sat on my other side and never missed an opportunity to crack wise, particularly when it came to a pair of pressbox denizens who were reminiscent of Statler and Waldorf.
Here’s to Andrew Callahan, who once worked with Fitz and was so diligent about charting players’ participation that he remained in his seat to the bitter end of even the most one-sided games to see who was on the field. (He now covers the Patriots for the Boston Herald.)
Here’s to Jeff Rice and Tyler Donohue and all the others who sat in our little corner of that little world – terrific people who always put their best foot forward.
And here’s to all the others who ventured into that space, from Altoona and Allentown, from Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, from Harrisburg and Hazleton. Did so not only on those hot September days – so very hot – but cold November nights. Saw good games and bad. Understood (most of them, anyway) that while we weren’t curing cancer, the goal was to get it right and say it right. That that’s always the goal.
So that’s what you do, regardless of the conditions. And if you make a connection with someone else along the way, all the better.