100th Anniversary Of Fenway Park: Boston College A Big Part Of Park's History

Today in Boston and on television screens across the nation, Red Sox fans everywhere will be celebrating the 100th anniversary of Fenway Park. Now whether you like or hate the park (ask my Dad, he grew up just outside of Boston and he HATES it), the history of Boston College athletics and Fenway Park weave together numerous times. Let's take a look at some of the memorable BC moments at Fenway.

-- October 31, 1914 - Boston College defeats Norwich University 28-6. Look at that, even back in 1914 Boston College had an offense that could score more than 21 points.

-- 1930's-40's - Boston College plays a majority of their football schedule at Fenway Park. This includes an epic matchup between the Eagles and Florida Gators in 1939. BC ended up losing the game 7-0, the only regular season loss of the season.

-- 1988 - After starting the season off slow, the Red Sox fired manager John McNamara and replaced him with BC alum Joe Morgan. The Red Sox responded with 12 straight wins, and making the playoffs. Sox fans refer to this time as "Morgan Magic"

-- 1990 - The Baseball Beanpot begins between Harvard, Boston University, Northeastern and Boston College. Over the 22 years BC has won the Beanpot nine times, and came in 2nd five times. Let's never speak of the 2012 Baseball Beanpot.

-- 2005 - Boston College builds $25 million dollar Yawkey Center, named after the Yawkey Family, former owners of the Red Sox.

-- 2010 - Frozen Fenway hits Boston. Before the Bruins played the Flyers, college hockey ruled the roost. In front of a packed Fenway Park, BC dropped a close one to Boston University 3-2. I think I vaguely remember that the 2010 season ended well for the Eagles.

-- 2012 - Boston College gets their first hockey win at Fenway Park, defeating Northeastern 2-1. Seeing a trend here ... BC plays at Fenway, they win a National Championship.

There may have been more events at Fenway, but those were just some of the highlights. There are so many opportunities for Boston College to continue to utilize Fenway in the future as well. Many fellow alumni received emails that Boston College will be holding a 150th BC Celebration Mass at Fenway in September. But how could athletics build upon their tradition, while using "America's Most Beloved Ballpark" to help advertise their program

-- Play a Frozen Fenway game every year. It may be a novelty, but it's one of those events that gets BC on the local radar, and could become a great yearly tradition for the hockey program

-- Schedule a football game there. Maybe yearly, maybe not. The Fenway Management group came out last year saying that they would like to schedule a college football game at Fenway. Last year BCI's Jeff proposed a Syracuse matchup (though this was before the ACC conference realignment)

I would prefer to stay away from playing a conference game at Fenway. There might be quirks to the game like playing in one direction as they did in Wrigley last season that I wouldn't want to affect a conference game. When Northwestern played at Wrigley last season, the decision to play in one direction was not made until the week of the game. So I am looking at Syracuse in 2013. Hopefully Syracuse will have a few more decent years between now and then and I think the Notre Dame game might as well be played at Foxboro rather than at Fenway. Fenway will provide fewer good seats to watch the game than Alumni would so I don't see the point in moving a game that will certainly sell out and already get a good television spot. The Syracuse game might sell out but would not be in a good television spot most likely. Moving the game to Fenway would probably get ABC coverage.

What about Notre Dame? One of BC's yearly out of conference games? USC?

-- ACC Baseball Tournament at Fenway. Given the current facilities BC will never be holding an ACC Tournament game at BC. What about holding it at Fenway?