STOUGHTON, Mass. _ The Steelers received an early wake-up call when the fire alarm went off at their Hilton Hotel at Logan Airport in Boston on Sunday morning, around 3:40.
It's an old trick that has happened on rare occasions to visiting college and pro football teams, especially on the morning of a big game such as the one the Steelers play this evening against the New England Patriots for the AFC Championship.
Already, some are dubbing it Alarmgate.
However, this one cannot be connected to the Patriots. Massachusetts State Police quickly arrested a 25-year-old East Boston man and charged him with disorderly conduct, disturbing the peace and pulling a false alarm at the hotel.
According to information posted by the MSP, Dennis Harrison was found walking on the hotel property after he pulled the alarm. He was not a hotel guest and "had no legitimate reason to be on hotel property."
He was being held by state police pending bail.
Steelers spokesman Burt Lauten said the disturbance was quickly handled by officials.
While fire trucks did show up, the hotel was not fully evacuated.
Former Steelers guard Alan Faneca, one of the 15 finalists for the Pro Football Hall of Fame vote in two weeks, said in a Tweet: "Never played a game in NE where that did not happen. Every single time."
After playing his first 10 seasons with the Steelers, Faneca played in two more with the New York Jets, who played in New England each year as a member of the AFC East Division.
Faneca told the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette earlier this week that it felt like a bit of poetic justice during the 2015 Super Bowl, when the fire alarm blared twice in three nights at the Patriots' hotel in Arizona.
"I laughed when that happened," Faneca said. "I thought it was pretty ironic when it happened to them."
While pulling a fire alarm to disrupt an opponent is an old trick that goes back years, it does not happen very often. No one can remember it ever happening in Mike Tomlin's 10 seasons as Steelers coach. And, in my 32nd season covering the Steelers, I cannot remember it ever happening previously.
This latest false alarm, though, will likely long be remembered by some Steelers fans, who still carry a torch for the Patriots' Spygate and Deflategate scandals.
