How To Find a Little Break In a Long Season
ATHENS – With the seriousness and stress of the Ohio University Bobcats hockey team in their season, it’s important to get a little bit relaxation and humor when you can to take the edge off.
A season that stretches from September to March can bring a lot of wear and tear, stress, frustration, and all-around exhaustion. It can be difficult to find a little mental break from that. But one Bobcat forward has the perfect cure-all.
Each game, spare sticks are set up to be brought to the bench outside of the locker room. They are propped up against the green and white concrete wall and wait to be brought out onto the bench.
But these spare sticks are not alone. On a masking tape label, every game, a different pun is written above the sticks. Each pun is a different take on the word “spare.”
SPARE Force One, SPARRY Potter, THIS IS SPARETA and SPERRY the Platypus are just a few of many that senior Gianni Evangelisti comes up with and sticks it to the wall before game time.
“I just put a pun or anything that rhymes with spare on some tape and put it up on the wall, and that’s where guys know where to put their backups,” Evangelisti said.
This is something that Evangelisti has done since he was playing junior hockey. One of his junior teammates was the original pun founder. Evangelisti felt at home when he came to Ohio, but something was missing.
There were no puns and there was no tape.
So, he took it upon himself to continue the tradition. He has done it ever since his time at Ohio University started. While he has done this, he learned a thing or two about the ways of the taped puns.
Some puns to stay away from that are bad luck are, Corey SPERRIES, and Smokey the SPEAR (with a little drawing of everyone’s favorite animated PSA).
“If there’s a theme, we try to match it up with that,” Evangelisti said. He found the perfect theme for that magical part of the year we all know, the holidays, “SPARING is caring,” written on tape.
On any given night that the boys in green are looking for a classic and safe one to use Evangelisti will slap up a placeholder saying, “Spare Force One.”
But the creativity can sometimes dwindle. Things may come down to the last minute, and that concrete wall in the narrow entrance to the locker room will be left bare.
Evangelisti knows he can count on some young up and comers to save the day. Whether it is an honest mistake of forgetting to put a pun up, or struggling with the perfect new pun, there is always support.
“If I ever struggle to come up with one, I’ll ask some of the guys for help, or I’ll search ‘things that rhyme with spare, tear, wear, care,’” Evangelsiti said. “Zach Frank helps me out sometimes, some of the younger guys remind me to put them up if I forgot.”
Sometimes in the wild world of sports, it is the little things that can be the most memorable. Evangelisti is sure to provide a little bit of fun and humor to ease the stress and demands of the season.