This was not like the Canada Day celebrations back home in Sarnia. Actually, it was unlike anything Mitch Bigras ever experienced.

Boston College came to Tallahassee for a three-game series against the Florida State baseball team in 2015. Bigras, a freshman at the time, was on the bench when he began hearing an extremely familiar song in the bottom of the fifth inning.

The tune? "O Canada," otherwise known as the Canadian National Anthem.

"My eyes kinda shot open and I was like, 'Oh, wow!'" said Bigras, a Sarnia, Ontario, native who is now a junior at BC. "I thought, 'I hadn't heard this for a while.' You don't hear the Canadian National Anthem too often."

Baseball is known for its oddities, traditions and superstitions. Signing "O Canada" whenever FSU is up to bat in the fifth inning checks the box for all three.

The anthem is sung primarily by The Animals of Section B, the assorted collection of die-hard Seminole baseball fans, whose sole mission is to make Dick Howser Stadium one of college baseball's most intimidating venues.

Shannon Thomas, who is the "zookeper" of the Animals of Section B, said the group began signing "O Canada" in 1988 when the Winter Olympics were being held in Calgary.

"It was just watching the Olympics every day and hearing the anthem every day," said Thomas, a 1999 FSU graduate who joined the group in 2000. "It was in their minds. [FSU] was losing and they thought, 'Hey. Let's hum the Canadian National Anthem.' And the won, and it's been a tradition ever since."



It's become more than a tradition. Signing "O Canada" has become a full-on performance like no other.

The Animals sit in a section of Howser more than 20 rows behind the FSU dugout. Before they start signing, they unfurl a massive Canadian flag which is held by two people while the rest of the group waves smaller Canadian flags attached to sticks.



So, what's it like to be an opposing Canadian player hearing your national anthem in Florida of all places?

"Every time we come up to FSU, it's something I think about," said Stetson junior Ben Onyshko, who is from Winnipeg. "I tell guys to wait for the fifth inning and they'll see. It's definitely unique."