LEWISTON — Dad Ernie announces the starting lineup. Mom Patti sells 50-50 tickets and dances in the aisles. Son Scott stays behind the scenes with jobs such as driving cars onto the ice. When she’s home from college, daughter Stephanie sells tickets and sings the national anthem.
They rarely miss a game at the Androscoggin Bank Colisee.
The Gagnes are devoted Maineiacs.
“I am the official ‘Ice Mama,’” Patti said. And she has the hockey jersey to prove it.
Ernie, the Maineiac’s public address announcer since the team’s fifth home game, grew up around hockey.
“I have the best seat in the house, and the worst,” he said. It’s down on the ice, right between the penalty boxes. “A lot of interesting conversations I’ve been privy to …”
Patti started early with the team as a volunteer, an energetic volunteer, selling raffle tickets.
“I run up and down every flight of stairs at the Colisee, I try to make it once around,” she said.
When “Cotton Eye Joe” comes over the speakers, the crowd’s known her to start busting a move.
“That’s when I claim to be adopted,” Stephanie, 20, said.
Scott, a senior at Lewiston High School, started interning with the game operations staff four years ago.
“My nickname is the ‘Gopher guy,’ go for this, go for that,” he said.
Ernie teaches fourth-graders at Geiger Elementary School. Patti owns Patti Gagne Agency, All-State Insurance, and said getting to know people one lap around the Colisee at a time has helped her agency.
She says she’s had hockey fans tell her, “I’ve been watching you bounce around the Colisee for years, I wanted to give you a chance to quote my business.”
This season the Gagnes are hosting their fifth player, acting as billet family to forward Christophe Lalonde. It connects the family to the team and lends an interesting perspective, Stephanie said. On the ice, the players are big figures to look up to. Off the ice, playing video games and talking to girls, she said, they’re regular 16-year-old guys.
“This is one of the best things for this community,” Ernie said. “It makes us part of the community. (Above) anything else, it’s just fun.”
Know someone everyone knows? We’d love to hear about them. Send ideas to kskelton@sunjournal.com
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- Patti Gagne holds the cash prize for the 50-50 as her husband, Ernie Gagne, announces the winning number during a Maineiacs game at the Androscoggin Bank Colisee.
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- Stephanie Gagne works the crowd selling 50-50 tickets during a Maineiacs game at the Androscoggin Bank Colisee.
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- Scott Gagne helps with activities before a Lewiston Maineiacs’ game at the Androscoggin Bank Colisee in Lewiston. Gagne, a senior at Lewiston High School, said he is pretty much a gopher. “Go for this, go for that,” he laughed.
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- Stephanie Gagne sorts stuffed animals during Teddy Toss Night at the Lewiston Maineiacs game in Lewiston. Hockey fans throw stuffed animals onto the ice following the Maineiacs’ first goal during the annual event. The toys are donated to local charities to be given to children.
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