Minnesota Football Fans Are Doing Norway's Viking Row to Go Along With P.J. Fleck's "Row The Boat" Mantra
Hats off to P.J. Fleck. He's a bit of a strange dude. He's a good football coach. Almost never finishes below .500. But he hasn't been GREAT at Minnesota. I appreciate how Minnesota has realistic expectations of themselves and keeps him around. They're never a real threat to win the Big Ten, yet every year they have a competent football team. But the most impressive thing about P.J. Fleck is his ability to get whatever school he's coaching at to FULLY buy in to his "Row The Boat" mantra.
The origins of "Row The Boat" are very sweet, albeit terribly sad. He created it in honor of his second son who he lost to a heart condition shortly after birth in 2011.
Pioneer Press – “As you hold your son as he passes away, your whole life changes. What you believe in, how you’ve believed in it, what you’ve done to that point, where you’re going to go and how you’re going to live your life all changes. But Row the Boat is really my second son’s life as I continue to live his life for him. It’s his life."
When P.J. Fleck was coaching at Western Michigan, I remember thinking "Damn... this school really loves this Row The Boat thing, huh?" It was all over their merch. It was on their jerseys. Their helmets. The team would come charging out of the locker room with oars in their hands.
It was to the point that I thought it's going to be awkward if P.J. Fleck takes another coaching job. Row The Boat had become such a Western Michigan thing, I wasn't sure he'd be able to take it anywhere else. And it was a little awkward. Western Michigan was the registered owner of the "Row The Boat" trademark. When P.J. Fleck did take the job at Minnesota, there was a report saying Western Michigan wouldn't let him take it.
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Eventually they came to an agreement. P.J. Fleck agreed to pay $10K a year towards a scholarship that would be given to a Western Michigan football player. Western Michigan still retains the right to use it, but P.J. Fleck was free to take Row The Boat to Minnesota.
Then I thought, "Minnesota isn't Western Michigan. They're a Big Ten school. They already have their Ski-U-Mah thing. Are they going to be willing go all in with P.J. Fleck's personal mantra the way a MAC school was?"
As it turns out, yes. They very much were. By P.J. Fleck's second year at Minnesota, they had full blown Row The Boat uniforms.
And when Norway took over the World Cup with their coordinated rowing chant this summer, we should have known Minnesota was going to break it out the minute their team stepped back on field.
Credit to that guy. He knows how to get a fan base to buy into a culture. It's a little corny to rip off Norway. But people forget, Norway ripped off Iceland first.
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And Norwegians aren't the only people allowed to row things. It's a damn good… whatever you call it. Clearly fans fucking love rowing in unison. You just gotta work on your timing Gopher fans.
That's decent. You got the noise down alright. But you've all gotta lean back and pull at the same time. Do it right on the "ROW!". Your band was kind enough to make this instructional video for you.
It kind of works out perfectly that P.J. Fleck ended up in Minnesota. They have the Minnesota Vikings, who are named after the prominent Scandinavian American culture of Minnesota. Row The Boat fits as well in Minnesota as it would anywhere else in the country. Except maybe Navy. But I doubt the troops are doing that.
Good luck this season in all your football/boat rowing endeavors, Minnesota.