March 5, 1997 Sean's Harmon Memories

My first Harmon experience:

I can still remember the first day I ever set foot into Harmon Gym. It was April 13, 1984. This was not an athletic event, nor a test of any kind...it was the Cal Band Spring Show. It was the Spring of my Freshman year, and I was a different person. Even though I hadn't joined Rally Comm yet, I had already become a Cal Band junkie. The show itself was a lot of fun, and the theme--"A year in the life of the Cal Band"--allowed the band to work in a wide variety of entertaining numbers.

Since that time, I have attended all but one Spring Show (though last year I ended up watching the dress rehearsal instead of the actual show). The entertaining shows include skits, music, and marching. This year's show is on Saturday, April 26, but is in Sacramento.

My first game---

During the Fall of my Sophomore year, I joined Rally Comm and found out that there were other sports besides football.

My first game in Harmon was an exhibition game against the University of Alberta. The game itself took place during the middle of Big Game week in 1984. The game itself was unremarkable, but it did feature a first and a last...It was my first, and it was the old scoreboard's last. Prior to the current electronic scoreboard, the Harmon scoreboard simply displayed the time and the score. The team names were displayed with movie theatre "marquis" letters. During this game, someone rearranged the letters so that CA was playing RATBALL (the person put the E elsewhere.

Another memory of the game was that it introduced the "Tuna" tradition to me with a vengence. Again, the game itself was unremarkable, so the only way the crowd could get into the game was to razz the other players. In this case, someone was given the name "Tuna". A thin kid with glasses was given the nickname "nerd" and a burly, hairy guy was given the nickname "sasquatch". It was funny when they would pass the ball between one another--"Toooo naaaa!" "Nerrrrrd" "Saaassssquatch".

Bring a towel.

The second game I remember watching was against UC Davis. Before the game, the old Rally Comm members told everyone to bring a towel to the game. I wondered what specific reason (other than the fact that towels are one of the most incredibly useful objects in the universe ;) we needed to bring a towel. The UC Davis head coach was so attached to his towel that he was called "towelhead" Hamilton (I can't remember his real first name.) People think that Bill Frieder and Jerry Tarkanian are obsessed with their towels; Coach Hamilton put those two to shame. He would *always* clutch his towel, chew it, shake it at people and so on. Since Rally Comm and the straw hat band all brought towels, you also have to imagine about 100 people shaking towels whenever Coach Hamilton would shake his towel. It was quite a sight. It was even funnier when several Band members stood in the rows behind the UC Davis bench and immitated every gesture Coach Hamilton made.

One other memorable thing about the UC Davis series was the Cal Aggie Marching Band-Uh. It was the first time I had seen another band play with the Cal Band and since they also played Cal songs, it was fun.

Unfortunately, because UC Davis is a division II school, and playing non-division I schools prevented us from getting into the NCAAs in 1986, Cal no longer plays them. Of course, now that Coach Hamilton has passed away, the series wouldn't be as fun.

Other Band Antics

I mentioned the band members razzing coach hamilton. There are a few other band antics that I can recall.

Even though I wasn't at Cal yet, the Band staged a halftime skit re-enacting "the play" at the Cal-Stanfurd basketball game in 1983.
As the Doggies--er--Dollies or the U$c cheerleaders finished performing, several band members would occassionally run out on to the floor and wipe it with towels.
For Reggie Miller's final game in Harmon, the band wore giant ears that stuck out (much like Reggie's).
Still, the response to Steve Kerr's "Straw Hat Pizza Band" comment was the best (for those of you outside the area, Straw Hat Pizza is a chain of pizza restaurants). Kerr was given a tuna pizza, and is the only player I ever recall who was named tuna before the game.

Posters and signs

Things were pretty bad that first year. Rally Comm divided itself up into "teams". Your team was responsible for attending a certain set of games (everyone went to the UCla and Stanfurd games) and also putting up posters. We would try to come up with clever posters, or ones that worked in something appropriate for the opponent. Ones I remember:

"Spade the Kitties" (for both WSU and 'zona)
"Dam(n) the Beavers", and
"Pluck the Ducks"

The last one was particularly memorable. Kathy (Smith) Heilmann and a few others painted the "P" as a basketball backboard, pole and support. Of course, the backboard was a different color thus allowing the sign to spell something different (how it got past the censors is beyond me).

Speaking of posters, some fans have also come up with good signs over the years.

Nobody Beats Cal (53 times in a row)
'Nother Bear Conquest (more on this later)
Eradicate Silly Powder-blue Nuisance (Witt Ashbrook held this up at a later UCla game).

Speaking of signs, how many people remember the little kid with glasses who used to sit to the left of the North basket and hold up signs for certain players during warm-ups?

One more sign comment. During the first year of the new scoreboard, after a questionable call by one of the refs (particularly against Kevin Johnson), the following advertisement would run:

	Wrongly Accused?!
        Contact Bill Glass, Attorney at Law

Yes, that's the same Bill Glass who's the voice of Harmon.

Band Signs

One last memory from that first year. Because the games weren't all that interesting, I spent a fair amount of time paying attention to the band. Over that year, I learned most of the "hand signals" which are used to inform the band members what song will be played next; I even learned a few of the signals for non-Cal songs.

One of the simplest signs was the one for "Louie, Louie"--the right hand held up, with the pinky, ring, and middle fingers curled in, index finger pointing straight up, and the thumb pointing straight out to form an "L" as viewed by those watching the director. Coincidently, this was the same as the "Laban" sign used by Corozon Aquino during the "People Power" revolution in the Philippines which took place at the same time. But back to our story...

The Coming of Campanelli

Speaking of "Louie, Louie", I still think fondly on the change of attitudes that took place when Lou Campanelli arrived. After a year of sitting in a mostly empty gym, Lou got crowds into many of the games. I can still see the way the student section would quickly fill up whilest sitting with Rally Comm up in the rafters.

At the Pac 10 home opener against Washington (which was also on ESPN), Cal fans were treated to a new tradition--the rolling out of the California Carpet. I can't think of how many times I helped roll it out, or how many times we almost collided with the Cal Band percussion session. Back then, the team would also run across the carpet onto the floor for warmups. The current carpet is much lighter and more likely to slip, so this practice has been abandoned. I still wonder what happened to the original.

My View of the end of the Streak

1986 brought the most memorable basketball game I've ever attended-- the end of the streak. Even though I didn't have credentials, I started taking pictures at games. When Cal played UCla, I sat in what had become my customary seat...on the floor, underneath the South basket. If you watch a video tape of the game, you'll see a guy in a white shirt and blue and gold hat with a camera--that's me! While you're watching, during the free-throw attempts at the north end, look for a guy holding up a sign saying "'Nother Bear Conquest"--that's Chris Hudson. On the back of the sign, it said "Fuck 'em Bears"...only once did he have the wrong side facing NBCs cameras (thanks go to his wife, team doctor Cindy Chang, for pointing out that one).

Other people have recounted the end of the streak. Don't forget the play of Chris Washington in the game though. When it looked like the Bears were going to collapse, he stepped up, tied the game, and then stole the inbounds pass and slammed it home to put the Bears in the lead for good with about 4 minutes left.

Other people have also mentioned the deafening noise of those games. I often judged how loud the crowd was by how long after the games my ears would ring (I should have brought earplugs). Still, there was an even better crowd excitement gage--If the crowd was excited enough, the NCAA championship and 2nd place banners, which were hanging over the center circle, would bounce up and down. I don't know if it's because the crowds aren't as exciting, or if it's because they've added cross beams in the roof, but that hasn't happened for a while.

Favorite taunts--

With the departure of Harmon, the echoes of the following taunts will be gone. Can you name the player and the team?

Cherrrr---ryl
Ossss-----borne
Redddd----hair
Noooo-----hair
Trevvv----or

Of course, then there are other opponents whom you could try to taunt, but only would STEP UP their game. The worst of these was Gary Payton. He didn't need Oski to spill a cake on his family to insipire him to tear the Bears apart.

There are other sports besides men's basketball.

When I arrived at Cal, I knew two players on the Women's Basketball (they were friends in high school). Unfortunately for me, it wasn't until 1987 that I watched the Cal women play. I've been a fan ever since. When asked about women's players, most people can remember Milica Vukadinovic (John Billburg has said on more than one occasion that if the basketball number "5" jersey is retired, it had better be hers), Jennifer Bennett, and maybe Trisha Stafford (who played for the Lazers this season). I also remember players like Anja Hellman, Jennifer Self, Teresa Palmisano, Ingrid Dixon, and Jackie Lear (ok, any guy who attended a women's game during her tenure remembers her).

The crowds at women's games are nowhere near as intense as those at the men's games...but the intimate setting of Harmon added to the family atmosphere. Part of that family atmosphere made it harder to do certain taunts (even the Band picks a "Bonnie" instead of a "Tuna"). I have to wonder what Haas is going to be like (though someday I'd like to see Haas filled for women's games).

That same year, I also attended plenty of women's volleyball matches, and a few men's and women's gymnastics meets. While the memories of those games are nowhere near as strong, they still exist.

Final memories--

Who could forget taking finals in Harmon? Those rickety old tables felt like they might collapse if you erased part of of your blue book. Climate control was non-existant. During the Winter semester, the place was as cold as the offices of Scrooge and Marley, and during the Spring, the sun would shine into the building and heat things up. Nancy Jamison said that she remembers taking too many bad finals there. On the otherhand, I spent far more time helping proctor exams for Math 1 and 16 S then I did taking exams. Since the 1S final was always the last of the semester, the place was usually cold instead of hot.

That's enough for now. A little later in the week I'll post about the final game and the reception in RSF.

              I have to wonder, how many foul balls have
                 been hit into Harmon over the years?