Go Griffs

        A griffin is a mythological creature with the head and wings of an eagle and the body and tail of a lion. The griffin, this formidable being of mythological reputation, is also the mascot of Canisius College. When someone asks me where I went to college, I say “Canisius” and then I ask if he or she follows college basketball at all – if so, then there is a possibility he or she has heard of Canisius, otherwise, few people outside of Western New York will be familiar with it. Basketball is Canisius’ major sport, and every once in a while, the Griffins make at least the first round of March Madness which is the NCAA playoffs.

        There was a guy I worked with during my thirty-month, second job, stint at the Mall of Georgia’s Barnes and Noble – he was the sports section expert while I mostly worked in the children’s department. John could never remember my name – but at some point I told him I had gone to Canisius College. That he remembered! Just a couple of years ago, a full decade after my leaving B&N, I saw John at our local favorite Italian restaurant. He recognized me but looked embarrassed – “John, you still don’t remember my name, do you?” He looked down at his salad and said, “Canisius.” Actually that flatters me – someone so far from Buffalo remembers me because of the Golden Griffins.

        The big rivalry in Western New York was called The Little Three – Niagara University, the purple Eagles with Calvin Murphy as their most famous player in the pros, Saint Bonaventure, the Brown Indians (until just a few years ago when they changed the mascot to the Bona Wolf) whose most famous turned-pro player was Bob Lanier, and Canisius – the Golden Griffs who had some basketball players picked up by the pros over the years, but none became as famous as Calvin Murphy or Bob Lanier.

When I was at college, most Saturday nights during basketball season we went to Memorial Auditorium even in the fiercest wintry lake-effects-snow weather, and watched the Griffs. There were quite a few memorable moments besides the games. The organ music was great. The mascot was always there – my friend, Trix, a fellow biology major, was the Griffin sometimes – she always said it was a great experience. Canisius had male and female cheerleaders – that was new to me. Hamburg High football and Boston little league only had girls.

One of the male cheerleaders was someone who hung out with the accounting majors in the class a year ahead of me. Another accounting major who was so good with nicknames, called the cheerleader, GoGriffs. And that was the only name I knew him by for a long time! GoGriffs was diminutive – which, when he gave his cheers, gave the impression of a bundle of energy. His smile was mischievous, on and off the court, at a game or at a rathskeller – you never knew what he was thinking, and it could go well for you, or it could go against you in a pierce to-the-heart-mock-you-out kind of way.

After a game one night, LR and I gave GoGriffs a ride to the PM – the Canisius after-game hangout – the Park Meadow bar. As we rode from downtown, all three of us in the front seat of Laura’s convertible (top was up, it was winter and freezing), Don McLean came on the radio singing American Pie. Laura and I both sang along, at the top of our lungs. Suddenly GoGriffs put his hand over my mouth – then only LR could be heard. For years I thought this was because my voice was so terrible and Laura’s was much preferred. But after writing this story back in 2008 and sending it in an email to LR, she wrote back saying that my mouth was the only one Mark, GoGriffs' real name, could reach – no doubt he would have liked both of us to have stopped singing along.

The only thing more American than American Pie, in my mind, is knowing all the words, singing along, and having a male cheerleader nicknamed GoGriffs riding alongside in the cold of Buffalo after a college basketball game wanting the singing along to stop!

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