This is what Boston College football looked like when I ventured to its Chestnut Hill, Mass., campus to cover Penn State’s game there in 1982:
— Penn State beat the Golden Eagles in that game, 52-17, pounding out 309 yards rushing and 309 yards passing on the road to its first national championship.
— The crowd of 33,205 was the quickest sellout in the history of Alumni Stadium, built in 1952. And that didn’t count the thousand or so who watched from the top level of a parking garage, the roof of a nearby sports complex and a science building about a quarter mile away.
— Joe Paterno conducted his post-game interview in the stands of the Boston College hockey rink, where a midget hockey league game was in progress, replete with screaming parents and blaring whistles.
— Practice inside Alumni Stadium the Thursday night before the game was open. Anyone was permitted to wander off the street and watch. Almost anyone. The Daily Collegian photographer I was with had her camera strapped around her neck as we sat there in the stands. BC head coach Jack Bicknell stopped practice, walked over to where we were sitting and asked, “Where are you two from?”
“Penn State,” she answered. Mistake.
With that, Bicknell pointed to the side gate and told us to leave. Now. He followed us out to make sure we were truly gone. After we departed, the Boston College coach blew the whistle and continued practice.
— A sportswriter for the BC school paper told me he was walking back from class that fall when he struck up a conversation with a slight-looking guy. When the subject turned to football, the stranger seemed to really know what he was talking about.
“How come?” asked the college sportswriter, who covered football.
“I’m on the team,” answered the little guy. “My name’s Doug Flutie.”
This is what Boston College football looked like when quarterback Doug Flutie was through with it:
— In Flutie’s three-and-a-half seasons as a starter, BC was 31-11-1 (after previously going 17-26), won two Lambert Trophies, earned a high-water No. 4 national ranking and had three bowl appearances.
— Victories over Alabama at home in Foxboro (20-13, 1983) and in Birmingham (38-31, 1984); two wins over Texas A&M; a 17-17 tie in Death Valley against defending national champion Clemson; and a 47-45 win over Miami in 1983, a game you may have heard about. That the all-time classic in the Orange Bowl, where Flutie heaved a 48-yard Hail Mary touchdown pass Gerald Phelan to win on the game’s final play.
— A quarterback coach from 1981-83 named Tom Coughlin, who tutored Flutie in his first three seasons at BC. Coughlin – who went on to win two Super Bowls with the New York Giants — talked Bicknell into naming Flutie the starter after his big-time mop-up final quarter as a freshman at Penn State in 1981.
— In his career against Penn State, Flutie won once, 27-17 at Sullivan Stadium in the suburbs of Boston in 1983. Overall, in 13 quarters against the Nittany Lions, he completed 87 of 155 passes for 1,205 yards, with 5 touchdowns and 5 interceptions. Game-by-game, he was: 1981 – 8-15-153, 1 TD; 1982 – 26-44-243, 1 TD, 1 int.; 1983 – 24-43-380, 2 TD, 1 int.; and 1984 – 29-53-447, 1 TD, 2 int.
This is what Boston College football looked like from 2000-2004, while Penn State was 26-33, with one winning season (9-4) and one (losing) bowl appearance:
— Entry into the ACC, a 42-21 overall record and the shank of a postseason string that included eight straight bowl appearances, with wins over Arizona State, Georgia, Toledo, Colorado State, North Carolina, Boise State and Navy.
— A 27-14 victory over Penn State in Beaver Stadium in 2003. Boston College scored three times in the game’s first 7:10, then Penn State lost two fumbles inside the BC 20 in the latter stages to seal the PSU loss.
— A 21-7 victory over Penn State in Alumni Stadium in 2004, in a debacle of a contest that saw the Nittany Lions surrender five turnovers and yield three touchdown passes to a BC quarterback not named Doug Flutie. It was the last time the Nittany Lions played Boston College.
This is what Boston College football looked like before its head coach, Steve Adazzio, came to town in 2013:
— 6-18 in 2011-12, with just one vcitory in its last 10 games.
This is what Boston College football has looked like since Adazzio left Temple and headed north:
— A 7-6 record in 2013, with a bowl game appearance against Arizona State, behind 2,177 rushing yards and 18 TDs by Andre Williams, a Heisman Trophy finalist and winner of the Doak Walker Award.
— Winners of 11 of their last 17 games, with a 7-5 record in 2014, behind quarterback Tyler Murphy, who has run for over 1,000 yards and passed for over 1,500 more, with a combined 21 touchdowns.
— A last-second 20-17 loss to unbeaten Florida State in Tallahassee just five weeks ago. The Seminoles won on a 26-yard field goal with 3 seconds left in the game. Its confidence bolstered, BC beat Syracuse 28-7 the next week.
In Yankee Stadium on Saturday, Boston College is looking to win its fourth consecutive game against Penn State.
— If it’s a low-scoring affair, look out.
