A Sunday Night in East Rutherford: Louie Dane

Part One

There is nothing quite like the sound of 80,000 people screaming at the top of their lungs continuously in unison for 3+ hours. But in late December of ’08, with the Giants playing the Carolina Panthers with the NFC’s #1 seed on the line, you could sense the extra vibrations in the vocal chords of every single one of those 80,000, taking the decibel level just over the top of what the normal human lung capacity would otherwise be.

Being at Giants Stadium that night with my brother will stand for a long time as the most memorable experience of both our lives.

It’s even more memorable because we almost didn’t get to go.

The story really begins a year earlier, when the Giants stunned the world and won 4 consecutive road games on their way to a Super Bowl title. I don’t think there was a better photo taken all year after Sports Illustrated captured the split-second where David Tyree pinned the pigskin to his shiny blue, NY-labeled dome. But then again, I am a Giants fan, and I guess you could say my opinion when it comes to those things is a bit irrational compared to somebody who thinks that the New York Giants are the big buildings that you can see on the Manhattan skyline.

I waited 8 months to watch the Giants play again, but I was forced to watch – like every single game from the previous season – on television. It’s really the worst thing you could possibly subject a football fan to; screaming yourself silly at the good – and at the bad. And with Eli Manning and the Giants, you’re sure to catch a bit of both every once in a while.

After the Week 1 victory at home against Washington, I knew I wasn’t about to let another season go by without trekking out to the Meadowlands to watch a real football game. I hadn’t been in at least 2 years. That’s like telling a vegetarian that they can only eat meat; there are other options available, but its just so painstaking that you’d almost rather starve. Just like the NFL and the TV networks expect me to do, I watch every game. But this time around, I logged on to Stub Hub and secured a ticket to football heaven.

Sammy and I didn’t anticipate just how important the game would be until the coming weeks, when the NFL announced that its flexible scheduling would move the Panthers game into their primetime slot on NBC. So here is the dilemma: Game on Sunday night. School on Monday morning. Tickets = $150 a pop. The decision was a tough one for my mother, but a no-brainer for me.

Before I knew it, it was the 21st. The Panthers were in town. The battle for #1 was here. Every five minutes, my mother would fashion another snowball out of her pocketbook-sized arsenal of Jewish mother worries (it happened to be snowing the day before, so the entire area was covered) and blind side me with yet another reason why we should drop the idea and watch the game on television. Uh-Uh. No way, Jose. We were going, and Momma wasn’t gonna stop us.

So, she packs us blankets and umbrellas like any mother should, fully aware of the stadium policy that prohibits non-clear bags. I, fully unaware of that policy, re-pack the clear plastic bag into my brand new North Face backpack.

We walk up to the Giants Stadium security guards, and we get gingerly turned away. “No bags allowed,” the guy told us. “You’re just gonna have to leave it in your car or hide it.”

“Hide it?” I ask, enraged at how my first-night-of-Chanukah present was going to be put to use. “We came here on the bus! Where do you suppose we leave it?”

“Not my problem. I don’t make the rules, I’m just doing my job.”

That guy is really lucky that it snowed. Sammy and I packed the snow like we had never packed before to get the bag completely covered.

It wasn't until we actually sat in our upper tier seats when we realized there were still two hours until kickoff. Bundled tighter than either of us had ever been before, we sat, and we waited. Little did we know then that the wait would be well worth it all...

Part Two coming soon...