Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, January 24, 1992 TAG: 9201240041
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Jack Bogaczyk
DATELINE: MINNEAPOLIS LENGTH: Medium
FOOTBALL FANS HAVE HOT TIME IN COLD CLIME
A few years ago when the NFL said it was going to play a Super Bowl in the Twin Cities, the assumption was Tampa-St. Petersburg.Actually, the NFL's annual idea of heaven included another Saint - Paul, who wrote letters to the Tagliabues that ended up part of the NFL gospel.
St. Paul and Minneapolis are sharing a river and Super Bowl XXVI, the only Super Bowl ever won by Minnesota. Once a decade, the NFL remembers that football is a cold-weather sport and plays its big game in a location where the temperatures are about the same as a quarterback's uniform number.
Then, the No Frostbite League takes the event indoors. Actually, that makes more sense than TV replay as an officiating tool. Everybody talks about the weather, but the NFL wigs are different. They do something about it.
Welcome to Minnesota, which, of course, is the Indian word for "land of 10,000 dirty snow piles." How cold is it? They still have snow on the ground from Halloween. Hey, it beats raking leaves, right?
A lot of people - loosely defined, sportswriters who are accustomed to taking their ice with a splash of bourbon - fretted about freezing their typing fingers off while covering the NFL's 26th extravaganza of excess. It may be frosty, but they certainly haven't gotten the cold shoulder from Minnesotans while warming up for Sunday's game.
Really, the weather hasn't been severely frigid this week. Some scribes, not having seen enough ice already, went to a hockey game Wednesday night at the Met Center. The largest crowd in Minnesota's NHL history saw the North Stars tie the Los Angeles Gretzkys. Hey, high school hockey sells out here, too.
"Playing the Super Bowl here is great," said John Madden, CBS Sports' answer to a local legend, the Pillsbury Doughboy. "They should play some games where you can't get any brie, and you certainly can't get any brie around here. But they should have games where they have sausage, and you can get sausage here."
The Buffalo Bills and the Washington Redskins will be playing in the Metrodome, which, for those of you flying in for the game, is just one of the large expanses of white in the downtown area. The others are snow-covered lakes.
You can distinguish the Metrodome roof from the lakes because the latter are dotted by small structures, vehicles and people. You don't go ice fishing indoors, unless it's inside one of those lean-tos that lend a little warmth on the ice.
Redskins kicker Chip Lohmiller said people just need to chill out about the weather. So, the local native and former University of Minnesota kicker plans to entertain several teammates today.
"We're going ice fishing," Lohmiller said, intending to prove to his buddies that Bear Bryant wasn't the only football guy who could walk on water.
Lohmiller is taking avid anglers Monte Coleman and Art Monk, among others, onto one of the frozen waterways. That is, unless they get cold feet.
"I guess I'm still going," Coleman said Thursday. "I'm not too crazy about driving out onto the lake. Or, maybe I am crazy.
"I asked Chip how many people die doing that and he said five or six a year. If Art goes, I guess I'll go. I'm kind of courageous, don't you think? I figure I'll either catch something or drown."
And what does Coleman figure he'll catch?
"Probably a cold."