New York, NY -- Every player at NYU's Friday night hockey game against Montclair State University has his own version of how NYU team captain, Dan Nemchek, ended up with an assault charge and how a Montclair State University fan ended up with a broken nose and seven stitches. As one of the team managers who witnessed the fight that erupted midway between the ice and the locker room, I have my own version that I told the police at Floyd Hall Arena.
But there's a story that goes beyond just the facts. Like the excitement of an NHL team pile-up around a newly won Stanley Cup, this second story doesn't get recorded in anything as concrete as a scorebook or police report. But to me it's the one that matters, because it reminds players and spectators alike that the passion behind the players is what sports are really about.
The Violets were ahead 3-1 after the second period, when they filed off the ice and passed a throng of inebriated Montclair fans who grew increasingly rowdy as the game progressed. The fans jeered NYU's purple jerseys, an insult the team has long since learned to ignore, even though rink security warned them twice to calm down. But when they began hurtling coins, and even spat at Violet forwards John Giardino and Justin McDermott, pushing ensued.
As if a flood barrier was broken, the fans poured off the bleachers to pursue the team into the locker room. As I stood on the fringes of what had become a mob, pushes soon turned into punches and hockey dads pried people apart as they tried to see what was happening at the epicenter. I was furious that fans, having crossed the line between spectator and participant, got caught up in school pride to the point of losing basic respect for the sport being played. I could hear Nemchek's voice pleading, "Not on my team" from within the crowd.
Rink security finally broke up the mob. Still straining against two people who held him back, a fan stood in front of me, pointing defiantly to his bloody nose and demanding that the players look at it as he spat mouthfuls of bloody saliva onto the ground.
Nemchek was the only person taken to the Montclair Campus Police Station because he volunteered to take responsibility for his team, who played without him in an eerily subdued third period. NYU went on to score three unanswered goals in an arena that had been evacuated of all spectators. Before he left, I overheard him repeating calmly to the police officer, "Fighting is not my thing."
The other managers and I stood dumbfounded outside the locker room, clutching water bottles that needed refilling, unsure whether to cry and hug or punch the wall in anger. Head Coach Lloyd Polanish saw that we were upset and told us, "It's hockey. There's going to be blood."
I realize the contact nature of the sport is part of its appeal. When I have to tell people the name of my hockey team, they always think I said 'Violence' rather than 'Violets,' and I admit, I make no attempt to correct them.
As managers we even endearingly refer to our team as the Fighting Flowers. What upset me more than the violence was the idea of martyrdom that Nemchek seemed to invoke. It just didn't seem fair that a person like him ended up in such a situation and that the blame for it fell solely upon him.
In the pregame drills, Nemchek's excitement for the season has been contagious. Always cheering and encouraging his teammates, he gets everyone so focused and motivated that the team even hugs after scoring goals in practices. The celebratory double-Dutch pantomime that follows home game wins is a legacy for which he's responsible.
"The night wasn't so bad after all. We won the game and I got to sleep in my own bed," Nemchek said on Saturday morning, with characteristic optimism. "I hate fighting. It's so lame. But when somebody is beating up my team..."
It's hard to say who's right when sports, the only place where occasional punching is condoned, and spectatorship collide. But I stick to my version: The way this year's captain handled Friday's events attests to his devotion to both his teammates and the game. I'd like to think that devotion is what makes the Fighting Flowers, and team sports in general, so engaging.