Cannot WAIT for this game!

The Red Bandana Game Lands On The 25th Anniversary, And Rutgers Isn’t Just A Visitor

The number: Market has Boston College favored by 3.5. My own model sees this as close to even, actually leaning Rutgers by a couple points. Real, live disagreement on a night where the number honestly feels secondary.

Some games are just games. This one isn’t, and I want to actually tell you why before I get into anything about a spread.

What This Day Actually Means At Boston College

This is BC’s 13th annual Red Bandana Game, and this year it falls on the actual 25th anniversary of September 11, played on the day itself. The tradition honors Welles Crowther, a 1999 BC graduate and former lacrosse player who was working as an equities trader in the South Tower when the planes hit. He didn’t run. He used a red bandana to cover his face from the smoke and debris and led as many as 18 people to safety before the tower collapsed and took his life at 24 years old. Survivors remembered him only as “the man in the red bandana,” and it took months before his family even learned what he’d done. BC has worn special red bandana uniforms in his memory every year since 2014.

Rutgers Isn’t Just Walking Into Someone Else’s Tribute

Here’s the part that makes this specific matchup land differently than a normal Red Bandana Game. Rutgers has real, personal ties to that day too. New Brunswick sits under an hour from where the towers fell, and 37 Rutgers alumni lost their lives on September 11. This isn’t the first time Rutgers has carried that weight into a game either, they honored those same 37 names on their own helmets playing Syracuse on 9/11 five years ago. Two programs, both genuinely connected to the same tragedy, meeting on the exact anniversary. That’s not a coincidence the schedule makers created, that’s just what this game actually is this year.

The Football Story Underneath It All

Here’s a real, late update worth knowing before kickoff. Dylan Lonergan, the former BC starter who was set to return to Chestnut Hill facing his old team, got hurt in Rutgers’ actual opener against UMass and hasn’t practiced since. Schiano confirmed AJ Surace takes over as the starter instead. The door isn’t fully closed on Lonergan, Schiano’s left open the possibility he could be available in an emergency role if he’s feeling well enough by game time, but he’s been straight that missing practice reps makes that a real long shot, not a likely one.

So the storyline isn’t gone, it’s just different now. If Lonergan doesn’t play at all, this becomes Surace’s game to run in one of the most emotionally loaded environments college football has all season, a real, significant assignment for a guy who wasn’t the starter a week ago. If Lonergan does end up available in relief, that return moment carries even more weight now, coming back from injury to face his old team on this exact night, instead of just a clean, expected start.

Both teams enter this genuinely humbled. BC lost its opener 34-15 on the road at Cincinnati. Rutgers lost at home to UMass, 37-21, after opening as a 29.5-point favorite, a real, ugly number to be on the wrong side of. Neither team walks in with momentum, which if anything makes the actual football more unpredictable, not less.

What I’m Watching For

The market likes Boston College at home, and a raw talent read probably does too. But my own model sees this as close to a coin flip, leaning Rutgers if anything, real signal worth knowing even if it’s not a loud one. Whatever the number says, I don’t think this is a game where talent alone decides it. This is the kind of night where the building itself becomes a factor, a crowd that’s been building to this exact date for months, two teams that both have real reasons to play with something extra. Fireworks feels like the right word for it.