Fight, Fight, Connecticut<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n They say it\u2019s all fun and games until someone loses an eye. With the Seton Hall Pirate already sporting an eye patch, he could almost be forgiven for not seeing what was in store after provoking our mascot in the Field House.<\/p>\n It was 1983, and\u00a0Nick Zaharias \u201985 (CLAS)\u00a0and the Pirate had agreed to perform a fake fight at one end of the basketball court. Fake.<\/p>\n \u201cIf you notice in the photo, he had the Seton Hall flag in our gym, which he shouldn\u2019t have been doing to begin with. He had it on a piece of lumber and he came up unannounced behind me and hit me on the back of the head. He actually cracked the Husky dog head.<\/p>\n \u201cI immediately turned around and grabbed him and said, \u2018What are you doing? This wasn\u2019t our plan.\u2019 And he said, \u2018I\u2019m sorry. I didn\u2019t mean to hit you that hard.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Zaharias walked away \u2014 but then the Pirate hit him again, this time even harder.<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s when I kind of lost it. I\u2019m like, well, that\u2019s it. This is our turf. This is not going to stand.<\/p>\n \u201cSo I turned around and just started throwing punches and then he started throwing punches, but he had a rubber mask on and I had the big head. I think I took the flag off and threw it in the crowd. The crowd went nuts.<\/p>\n \u201cAnd then I walked away like Rocky.\u201d<\/p>\n That is, until the next day when then\u2013athletic director John Toner called Zaharias to his office.<\/p>\n \u201cHe said, privately, \u2018That was pretty cool. You protected the pride. But I gotta do something.\u2019 So I had a little punishment. I think a friend had to be the Husky dog for one game or something like that.\u201d<\/p>\n A couple of years later,\u00a0Ray Shaw \u201986 (CAHNR), \u201902 MS\u00a0took down the St. John\u2019s mascot during a men\u2019s basketball game in the Hartford Civic Center.<\/p>\n Late in the second half, with the visitors beating UConn badly, the opposing mascot approached Jonathan and suggested some lewd and unprintable theatrics. Shaw, knowing the crowd was watching, pushed him away with an exaggerated double hand wave.<\/p>\n \u201cThen he comes over to me and reaches his hand out like, \u2018Oh, I\u2019m sorry.\u2019 So I go to shake his hand and he grabs me, and I say to myself, \u2018This is it. It\u2019s on.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n With the St. John\u2019s mascot pulling on the securely tied Husky head, Shaw wrestled him to the court, where they rolled beneath the basket until referees separated them. Shaw, still on the court, looked up \u2014 and straight into a video camera piping the whole thing into the Jumbotron.<\/p>\n \u201cI did the first thing that came to mind: I put my arms up in a double bicep flex, and the crowd went absolutely nuts.\u201d<\/p>\n The next morning, like Zaharias before him, Shaw found himself in John Toner\u2019s office. Shaw was also suspended for a game.<\/p>\n![\"Jonathan](\"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/IMG_0600_2-244x300.png\")