Story Time -- Titus Sucks Edition

After reading commentor Jeremy's story about the Bowling Green player who had the same name as himself, I feel compelled to tell my "Titus Sucks" story as another example of how you never know who is listening to the chants.

I take you back to February of 2002. The Michigan students were away on spring break. I was not, since I'm a big nerd and I'd rather attend hockey games. As such, we didn't have our usual seats and there actually weren't all that many Michigan students in the crowd. We had a small group right around us however.

Sometime in the first period of Friday night's game, Buckeye defender Scott Titus took a cheap shot at Michael Woodford. For whatever reason, that set off our group of students. We started chanting, "Ti-tus Su-ucks" for his entire shift, whenever he was on the ice the rest of the game. Then as soon as he would step off the ice, the chant became "We Want Ti-tus!". It was probably funnier at the time than it actually was--it certainly wasn't all that creative. But we had fun.

Things escalated a little bit when an older woman came storming over to our section. She demanded that we stop the chant because "he's my son, Dwight Helminen's my nephew and I know Bill Martin, so if you don't stop I'll make sure that your season tickets get revoked!"

Our BS-o-meters were beeping heavily at that point--not to mention the fact that it was a game that we had to buy separately, so we weren't using our season tickets--so the chant kept going. There was lots more yelling.

That night, I did a little research. I talked to a buddy of mine who was semi-decently close to the USA program. He said to his knowledge Titus and Helminen weren't related. Which meant that she was full of crap (we think....) and the gloves could come off again the next night.

We got to the rink Saturday night, and as we were walking to our seats, the usher called us over. We figured, here it comes. We're gonna get yelled at. We walked over there and the usher says to us, "Guys.......I want more Titus cheers tonight. That woman yelled at me for 10 straight minutes. Call him every name in the book!"

So the chants started up again. The lady freaked out again, and she did something to get herself ejected from the arena. Around us, the other fans were wondering "What do you have against Titus??" We explained, and the chant grew and grew. Eventually it was a decent amount of our section.

Classy? Not at all. But next time, don't take a cheapshot at our player, you Buckeye trash.

Things got even better when I opened up Paula Weston's CCHA Preview for the next weekend only to see this:

Thank the hockey gods, however, that someone remembered something at Yost. Whenever Buckeye defender Scott Titus was on the ice, a small but enthusiastic group of Michigan fans chanted, "Titus sucks! Titus sucks!" When he was off the ice, the group chanted, "We want Titus! We want Titus!"

It's shocking that this group would even deign to use the junior's real name. After all, in the Michigan Daily, the student newspaper, Titus was known as "The Villain" — never a name, though sometimes his number (five) was mentioned — after a Michigan-OSU series two years ago in Columbus.

During the third period of the second game of that series, Mike Comrie — remember him? — cross-checked Titus near the right boards in the OSU end, and a brawl ensued. The only player who did not participate was Josh Blackburn, content to watch it all from his net at the other end. Jeff Jillson — remember him? — and J.F. Dufour went at it the best, dropping gloves and exchanging slugs. Buckeye goaltender Ray Aho mixed it up with someone a foot taller than he, but memory fails as to whom. However, both Aho and the Wolverine quit their small brawl by mutual consent, both smiling when it was over.

Titus — whom the Michigan student reporters blamed for the fight — was triple-teamed during the melee, hardly causing any damage.

After the game, Mark Kosick said that the Buckeyes were always cheap and dirty, and Eric Meloche responded by calling the Wolverines "weasels." The Michigan Daily called Titus "The Villain" in every subsequent issue.

Ah, those were the days.

Now, we only started the chant because of the cheapshot at Woodford. I had no idea about the back-story there. But it doesn't make it any less funny to me that we were mentioned on USCHO.

Those were the days....