Christie shows fightin' spirit as fan of Delaware Blue Hens

Gov. Christie decided not to travel to Frisco, Texas, to watch his cherished alma mater, the University of Delaware, compete Friday for a national football championship.

"I'd want the kids to come, and they just got back to school," Christie said in an interview Thursday.

But the whole family will be glued to ESPN2, he said.

Eastern Washington is in for a "severe whipping" at the NCAA championship game, he predicted with his usual gusto this week.

Christie, Class of 1984, is a die-hard Fightin' Blue Hens fan. He and some college friends share a block of 16 season tickets by the 10-yard line. He makes nearly every home game, his game buddies say. While on the campaign trail, Christie text-messaged them for quarter-by-quarter updates. "It was brutal not being able to go," Christie said.

In the stands, New Jersey's chief executive "cheers like he governs," said Bob Teeven, who attended Delaware with Christie and sits with him.

"He holds everyone accountable on the field and has been known on occasion to share some insight from the stands," Teeven said, which sounds like a politically correct way of saying the governor screams his head off.

"I'm a vocal guy," Christie said. "If I believe the referees have made a bad call, I let them know by name."

K.C. Keeler, a linebacker on Delaware's 1979 national championship team, has been the Hens' head coach for nine years.

Christie "bleeds the colors, no question about it," he said with a laugh.

Keeler recalled a booster event that Christie and his wife, Mary Pat, Class of 1985, organized at a North Jersey hotel.

Christie was U.S. attorney at the time. The room was packed with alumni. At the end of the evening, everyone cleared out except for Keeler, the university's basketball coach, and Christie, who was still holding forth about the need to refurbish Delaware Stadium with luxury boxes and rehab the team's training facilities.

"When we get a chance to talk ball, he will talk forever," Keeler said.

Christie, 48, usually attends football games with Mary Pat and their four children - him in his favorite school fleece, his family sporting blue and gold. His game-day group is rounded out by folks he met when they all were in the school's student government.

Rich Mroz, 49, a Haddonfield lawyer who was chief counsel for the Whitman administration, lived on Christie's floor in the Christiana Towers dorms. Christie was a baseball nut, having played on a high school state championship team in New Jersey.

"He was a big Mets fan, and I was a Phillies guy, but we overcame our differences," Mroz said.

The first Hens game the friends took in was a 24-0 loss to Holy Cross on a freezing fall afternoon in 1983. They sat in the end zone, wearing nylon jackets and no gloves or hats. It was 28 degrees at kickoff.

"I just remember how damn cold it was," Christie said.

The next season, Christie and crew made a trip to Veterans Stadium to watch the Blue Hens defeat Temple. As current and former student government presidents, they were invited up to a private box filled with Pennsylvania and Delaware politicians. Christie - then a law student at Seton Hall University - worked the room, Teeven said.

As Christie and Mary Pat settled down and began a family, Blue Hens games remained a staple.

There were the years featuring Rich Gannon and Joe Flacco, both future NFL quarterbacks. In 2003, Christie and his pals flew to Chattanooga, Tenn., to watch the Hens roll over Colgate for their sixth national title. There were snow squalls that night.

"The snow showers of Chattanooga," Teeven said, as if recalling an old war experience.

Christie bought his season tickets a few years after graduation. The seats come with reserved parking in the stadium lot, which makes for better tailgating.

"When we were single we used to be out there at 9 a.m.," Teeven said.

For a time, the group carried maracas and did a conga line to their seats. "I think we had too much to drink one time, and it became a tradition," Christie said. "Everybody would cheer for us."

Now game days are a family ritual. The maracas have been retired, Christie said.

Everyone arrives a couple of hours before game time. Tables are set up and, in bad weather, a tent. Footballs are tossed. Mary Pat has been known to work the grill. Christie likes to bring Cinnabons, Teeven said.

Before heading into the stadium, the gang convenes a bull session on injuries, past game performances, likes and dislikes, and "keys to the game" for a Hens victory, Teeven said.

Christie usually leads these conversations, Teeven said.

"He's the head cheerleader," he said.

Not much has changed since Christie became governor, Mroz said, except that his old pal is chauffeured by his state police detail.

"Two hours and 20 minutes flat," Christie said of his travel time to Newark, Del.

There are ESPN cameos now, and fans who introduce themselves. But "Chris hasn't changed," Teeven said. "He's still his old self."

There have been no heckling incidents yet, Mroz said.

Vice President Biden, a 1965 Delaware graduate, also makes home games when he can. But he has better seats, Christie said.

"Right on the 50-yard line," the governor said with a touch of envy. "I go down and say hi."

The games are an escape, Christie said, a way to reconnect with his youth. "I met my wife there," he said of his alma mater. "It's a second home to me."

Christie attended six home games this season, but none of his group has made the trip to Texas for the final game in the Football Championship Subdivision (formerly Division I-AA) playoffs.

"The whole family will be around the TV," he said. "My sons already have their jerseys ready."

Christie will be on campus Sunday as speaker at the winter graduation ceremony.

The last time he spoke at the school's commencement was in 2004, weeks after the Blue Hens won their last title.

If the team wins again, Christie crowed, it will be because he was a "good-luck charm."

But if the Blue Hens somehow lose, Christie reasoned, sounding like a veteran politician, "I had nothing to do with it."