By Emily McCarthy, News Correspondent
Few NBA arenas house more history than Boston’s TD Garden. From the signature of legendary Celtics coach and president Red Auerbach emblazoned on the parquet to the 17 championship banners suspended from the rafters, the Garden is a shrine to one of the greatest franchises in all of sports.
On Sunday afternoon, the Northeastern men’s basketball team had the privilege of playing at the Garden as they took on Boston University in the first game of the inaugural Coaches vs. Cancer Massachusetts Tripleheader.
“It was a great experience,” redshirt junior forward Scott Eatherton said. “I’ve been to a couple games there. I really didn’t think that when I first transferred here I would ever play there. I really enjoyed it and I know our team did, too.”
The Coaches vs. Cancer program offers basketball coaches and their teams a way to contribute to the fight against cancer. Part of the proceeds from ticket sales for Sunday’s tripleheader, which featured Northeastern and BU, Boston College and the University of Massachusetts Amherst and Harvard University and the College of the Holy Cross, supported Coaches vs. Cancer and the American Cancer Society.
Eatherton, who posted 15 points and 10 rebounds in the Huskies’ 72-69 loss to BU, said “it meant a lot to go out there and represent for a good cause.”
Sophomore guard Zach Stahl echoed Eatherton’s sentiments.
“It was a great experience to be able to play at the Garden,” Stahl said. “It’s kind of a dream, I’m sure, of everyone’s to play somewhere where NBA players play and especially to do it for such a great cause. It was just a really good opportunity.”
Despite the loss, Eatherton said he and his teammates appreciated the chance to play at the Garden and support the Coaches vs. Cancer initiative.
“I don’t think it’s set in yet,” Eatherton said. “It will probably set in a couple years from now when I look back on it, that I actually got to play there. I was looking forward to it when I saw it was the first game on the schedule. And we had a lot of fun.”
