The Boston Red Sox won’t play a home game for more than four months, but this weekend it felt like midsummer at Fenway Park.
On Saturday night, the ballpark was at its glittering best when the University of Notre Dame made Kenmore Square its home away from the Gold Dome, bringing big-time college football to Boston. The Shamrock Series was a smashing success, despite the fact that the Fighting Irish were playing a home game hundreds of miles from their real home while the visitors from Boston College were just a few T stops away from campus.
There was shock and outrage from the locals who managed to get a ticket to the event and were greeted by a sea of Green, Blue and Gold. There wasn’t a BC logo to be seen in the park. Both end zones were stamped to represent the boys from South Bend. The voice of Mike Collins echoed through the ballpark after every Irish first down, just like it does at Notre Dame Stadium. And fans of the fourth-ranked Irish outnumbered fans of the Eagles by a good 10 to 1.
A day later more than 27,000 sat through a cold mist to watch Galway and Dublin battle – literally – through a wild exhibition of hurling that featured an old-fashioned donnybrook that would’ve made the big, bad Bruins of the 1970s proud.
Through it all, Fenway was the star. Years ago, Notre Dame created the Shamrock Series to take its national brand on the road. They’ve played at the new Yankee Stadium and the Alamo Dome, but nothing has come close to playing in the shadow of the Green Monster. At halftime, the Notre Dame marching band did a routine showing a batter hit the ball over the fabled left-field wall.
Notre Dame Coach Brian Kelly, by way of Everett, Massachusetts, and Assumption College in Worcester, Massachusetts, understood the meaning of playing at the home of his favorite baseball team. His team survived a scare from BC with a 19-16 win in a game marred by five Irish turnovers.
Kelly used a baseball analogy to express his frustration at the team’s lack of ball control.
“It’s like leaving runners in scoring position,” said Kelly to laughter.
Fenway Park scored big with football fans from New England to the Midwest. Fifteen years ago we thought the park was on its last legs.
Now, we celebrate “America’s Most Beloved Ballpark.” A field that once was used for baseball, and only baseball, has been home to football, soccer and ice hockey.
And, of course, hurling. Sunday’s match featured some of the toughest athletes we’ve ever watched, battling tooth-and-nail with big hearts and very little padding. I’m still not sure I understand the rules, but if you love hockey or football you had to love what you saw at the friendly confines of Fenway.
Next up, eight high school teams will get to play at the park this weekend as ownership keeps the gridiron set up long enough to host some of the area’s Thanksgiving matchups. What an experience for high school athletes closing out their seasons.
Since coming into town in 2002, Fenway Sports Group hasn’t just renovated Fenway Park – the ownership team has opened it up to hundreds of thousands of people who don’t get to many baseball games.
Yet baseball is still the bedrock upon which all of this is built.
We’ve still got a full winter to get through before the boys of summer return and the sight of Fenway’s fabled lawn warms our hearts.
Until then, watching the Fighting Irish – and some fighting Irishmen – was a pretty good way to pass the time on a late-fall weekend.
Tom Caron is a studio host for the Red Sox broadcast on NESN. His column appears in the Portland Press Herald on Tuesdays.
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