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Brittany Marino and Paul Basken, to whom she donated a kidney, attended Tuesday’s playoff game between the Bruins and Carolina Hurricanes in Raleigh.
She gave him a kidney, so what’s a couple of Bruins tickets between friends?
The surgery at University of Maryland Medical Center in Baltimore went swimmingly. Soon after, Paul 2 was healthy, and Paul 1 and Brittany had a baby on the way.
Brittany Marino and Paul Basken, to whom she donated a kidney, attended Tuesday’s playoff game between the Bruins and Carolina Hurricanes in Raleigh.
She gave him a kidney, so what’s a couple of Bruins tickets between friends?
So, fast forward to Tuesday, and Paul Basken and Brittany Marino were at PNC Arena together, in her company’s corporate box. Somehow, she managed to win the company raffle that scored them tickets and various perks.
At the end of the first intermission, they got to greet the Hurricane players before the second period. Bruins goalie Tuukka Rask had stymied the Hurricanes in the first period in an otherworldly performance. Paul Basken resisted the urge to chant “Tuukka! Tuukka!” in “Toga! Toga!” “Animal House” fashion. He didn’t want to embarrass Brittany, so he just offered polite, completely disingenuous encouragement to the doomed ’Canes.
The Broons won, putting the ’Canes on the brink of being swept.
Basken slept over at the Marinos’. Before taking the train back to Washington, he got to spend time with Sophia, Brittany’s 1-year-old daughter.
Brittany got a kick out of watching two people who both carry a part of her bond.
“It is,” she said, “very humbling.”
So is what the Bruins have done to the Hurricanes. But, then, that’s just a game. This is life.
