Tomorrow is 20 years.
Two decades ago Thursday, The Boston Globe featured a headline that was meant for posterity. "He threw it into forever" read the front page on the day after a kid from Natick named Douglas Flutie used all the muscles in his right arm to throw a ball 48 yards and into the midsection of history. He threw that ball into the Miami night and hit his intended target, some guy named Gerard Phelan. Phelan caught the pass and Flutie was lifted into the air by a teammate.
Up with him went the hopes and ideas of a city. Better yet, a region.
"Everyone was just so happy. It really transcended everything. They were Boston's team that year," said Reid Oslin, then-Sports Information Director for BC and author of Tales from the Boston College Sideline.
The game was played the day after Thanksgiving and was the featured game on television sets everywhere. The match-up pitted the defending national champion Miami Hurricanes, ranked No. 12 in the nation at the time, against the No. 10-ranked Eagles.
Both offenses went back and forth, but it all came down to one play. It is usually referred to as the Flutie Miracle. Of course, that is, to everyone but one person. Phelan's mother would like to set the record straight.
"Everyone calls it Flutie's pass except Gerard's mother. To her, it's the Phelan catch," said Oslin.
So when the 1984 football team, which won the Cotton Bowl that year and finished No. 5 in the national polls, was reunited Nov. 5 in the Shea Room of Conte Forum, there were nothing but smiles.
It was a Field of Dreams moment. Straight from the end zone pile on the Orange Bowl field and fast-forwarded 20 years, about 65 of them came back. Back to the days when the Eagles were highly ranked.
They finally changed out of their white game jerseys with maroon numbers and maroon names printed on the back and changed into shirts and ties along with glasses and grins of camaraderie.
This wasn't the Orange Bowl, and there was no last second celebration. But there was reliving; reliving a moment and a season. There were high fives and "how the hell ya been's." Old team managers shook hands with old players. Old players caught up with old coaches. Most of all, the new BC caught up with the old BC.
When the highlight reel of the season came on, voices went down and cheers rose up. Eyes opened like umbrellas and horseshoe-sized smiles crossed the former players' and coaches' faces. It was like they were back in Miami.
It was 1984 all over again.
All of a sudden Ghostbusters was blowing up at the box office again. Reagan was beating Mondale in a landslide victory, and The Cosby Show was debuting on NBC.
The Boston Celtics defeated the Los Angeles Lakers in a seven-game NBA Finals. The Los Angeles Raiders won the Super Bowl over the Washington Redskins.
BYU went 13-0 to win the NCAA football championship, and some guy named Douglas Flutie threw a ball 48 yards to a guy named Gerard Phelan to carry a school named Boston College into the history of heroic highlights.
What was I doing that night in 1984? I was chugging bottled milk and eating mashed peas while staring up at my horse-and-cow mobile, thinking of how to break free from the restraints of my crib. It was 1984, and I was just born. Funny thing is that, for all intents and purposes, so was BC football.
Twenty years later, forever is still going.
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