One of my core childhood memories is the 1995 AFC Championship Game at Three Rivers Stadium. I was the 10-year-old tagging along with my dad and two of his friends, who went by Zandy and Mammal.
Although I’m 5-foot-10 now, I remember being too short to see the field, standing on my tiptoes, mostly watching the ‘90s-style TVs just above our heads. Everyone in the stadium collectively held their breath during the game’s final play, when the Colts’ Jim Harbaugh threw a high pass toward the end zone. The pass was ultimately ruled incomplete because it had bounced off the turf after being deflected by a Steeler defensive back. We won, and we were headed to our first Super Bowl in 16 years — since well before I was born.
Some memories from that afternoon remain as little flashes in my mind. Drunk yinzers greeted police with cries of, “Hey officer, we’re going to Tempe!”(That’s where the Super Bowl was that year.) Later my dad waved his precious 1970s original Myron Cope Terrible Towel out of Mammal’s pickup truck window while I was in the backseat, leaving me terrified he’d lose it. He held on to it tightly, and we excitedly cheered with the other traffic as we made our way to my grandma’s house in Clairton.
A person holds a yellow towel with bold black text reading "The terrible towel — A Pittsburgh Original."
Kate Oczypok holds up her “Terrible Towel” in her living room on Aug. 13 in Coraopolis. (Photo by Caleb Kaufman/Pittsburgh’s Public Source)
For years, that day and that ride crystalized my feelings about the central place of sports fanaticism in Pittsburgh’s sense of community. Thirty years later, as another season begins, I’ve seen it from three different angles: as an expatriate, the spouse of another team’s fan and a self-employed piano teacher concerned that the civic religion may be taking precedence over other avenues for creativity and personal development.
A different view from the Beltway
Fast forward eight years from that fateful championship game. I decided to attend American University in Washington, D.C., which turned out to be one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. During my college years and beyond, I felt a strong connection to fellow Pittsburghers I met along the way.
I was lucky enough to experience the early Big Ben and prime Jerome Bettis years in college. Being from Pittsburgh made football an easy way to meet friends and I’ll always remember with gratitude games watched in apartments that cost us too much, including the big Super Bowl XLV party I threw at my studio apartment, packed with friends, great drinks and even better food (even if that Super Bowl didn’t go our way).
Over the years, I attended many Penguins games against the Washington Capitals at Capital One Arena in D.C. with my husband, Brad. It was definitely jarring at first to be in an arena full of red, but I felt a renewed sense of pride to be in black and gold.
The more games Brad and I went to, the more I started to notice Pens fans. It was fun to chat with people in Pens jerseys while waiting in line for food or to go to the bathroom, learning where they grew up in the ‘burgh.
Living with a Bills fan
I met Brad two years after that Super Bowl XLV loss. I soon found out that he was a fellow Steelers fan — but that the black and gold wasn’t first in his heart. He grew up on Pennsylvania’s border with New York, in a small town called Gillett, where they could only get Buffalo Bills games on TV. So he found himself drawn to the team, those longtime underdogs. Like Brad’s and my personalities, our favorite football teams underscore the “opposites attract” maxim. While the Steelers have won six of the eight Super Bowls they’ve reached, the Bills have lost all four of those that they’ve appeared in.
Now that the Bills are good, Brad’s fandom has been more out in the open. With talented quarterback Josh Allen at the helm, Brad’s Bills devotion has been quite eye-opening for me.
While Brad has always been a sports cards and memorabilia collector, in the last five years, he’s purchased a Josh Allen signed helmet, another signed helmet by a separate Bills player, a signed Josh Allen jersey, an Allen jersey to wear and Bills baseball caps. I even purchased him another jersey by a player who shares Brad’s last name and Bills pajama pants.
Person holding a Buffalo Bills football helmet while wearing a matching Bills jersey and sitting on a brown leather couch.
Brad Phillips holds his signed Buffalo Bills helmet in his living room on Aug. 13 in Coraopolis. (Photo by Caleb Kaufman/Pittsburgh’s Public Source)
You’re wondering how this played out during the January 2024 wildcard playoff game pitting the Bills versus the Steelers. I had never seen Brad get into a game so much. He was literally on the edge of his seat, while I was comfortably on the couch thinking, “Well, if it doesn’t go our way this year, we’ll try again next year.” It made me realize how exciting it is for fans of teams like the Bills, after the heartache of four consecutive Super Bowl losses in the early ’90s.
Even as a Steeler fan, I’m secretly hoping Brad’s team gets a Super Bowl win soon.
But is there room for the arts?
After living in the D.C. area for just under 20 years, Brad and I made the decision to move back to Pennsylvania, specifically Pittsburgh. Surprisingly, it has not brought us back to Heinz Field — oops, I mean Acrisure Stadium.
Why not? Thirty years after that thrilling AFC Championship, it’s a different world. Tickets are far pricier, and with Brad being declared legally blind last December, in-person fandom can be hard to navigate. We do love watching at home, though, especially since the invention of flat screen TVs! Having family or visiting family for big games is a lot of fun, too.
Last year, when the Steelers played on Christmas Day, 21 of us gathered at my parents’ house (per tradition), except that year our red and green was littered with bits of black and gold.
Games with extended family are always just a little bit louder, have a little bit better snacks (the Buffalo chicken dip my family makes is delicious), and are genuinely more fun, even though that Christmas game didn’t go our way.
But since I’ve moved home, I’ve seen a bit of a flip side of our civic obsession.
In Pittsburgh, sports fandom is indeed almost like a religion. Babies are swaddled in Terrible Towels at UPMC Magee-Womens Hospital. A special Christmas gift in elementary school often involves some variation of a Steelers or Pens jersey. Families plan their weekends in the fall around Steeler games. When the new pope was announced in May, he even blessed a Terrible Towel in the crowd.
Younger generations who’ve grown up with the internet, phones and other technology at their fingertips have been told by parents to stop being on screens and get outside. Often, being outside involves playing a sport.
Don’t get me wrong, I’m 100% behind the value of team sports, especially for girls. I see and appreciate how much high school football brings our communities together.
But I don’t think sports should be everything. In addition to writing, I am a piano teacher in the after-school hours. I teach virtually to make things easier for parents who don’t wish to commute to another extracurricular. Sadly, I’ve had a lot of trouble finding new students in Pittsburgh, and though I’d love to be teaching more local learners, It’s been easier to recruit students from D.C.
A man in a blue Buffalo Bills jersey and a woman in a black Pittsburgh Steelers jersey stand next to each other outdoors.
Brad Phillips and Kate Oczypok pose on their porch on Aug. 13 in Coraopolis. (Photo by Caleb Kaufman/Pittsburgh’s Public Source)
Despite being a football town, we mustn’t forget how much music and the arts can broaden our minds. Exploring your interests at a young age and deciding what you’re passionate about is so crucial to becoming a well-rounded human.
Even with some of the headaches of searching for new students in a sports-centric city, football is still ingrained in my blood. When the Bills come to town in November, I hope to be there with Brad, even if only one of us is in black and gold.
Kate Oczypok is a freelance writer and piano teacher and can be reached atkate.oczypok@gmail.com.
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