The 21 and older crowd at Central can now enjoy an alcoholic beverage based on the university, thanks to a partnership between Five Churches Brewing and the CCSU athletics department.

The drink is called The Devil Went Down to Arch Street, as a reference to the Charlie Daniels song “The Devil Went Down to Georgia.” The Devil refers to Central’s mascot, and Arch Street is where Five Churches Brewing is located.

Austin Japs, head brewer and partner of Five Churches Brewing explained that he wanted to make a drink that was both tasty and affordable. The beer is an Indian Pale Ale and uses two hops to get it’s flavor.

“I took two hops that I think are vastly underrated and also reasonably affordable, which allows us to keep the cost down,” Japs said. “So we used comet and calypso hops in it.”

Japs said these were two hops that he liked and knew tasted good separately, but this was his first time putting the two together. He also pointed out that comet and calypso both start with the letter c, so they could stand for Central Connecticut.

 “Coincidence? Maybe,” Japs joked.

The beer also has only six percent alcohol by volume, because Japs wanted the drink to be sessionable.

“It’s not a one and done beer, which is important for college students,” Japs said.

Last fall, Five Churches Brewing made an appearance at Central’s Homecoming game, handing out samples to attendees who were of age. While there, they asked what style beer people preferred and what they wanted to call the beer. In this sense, it is Central’s beer.

Five Churches Brewing is owned by the Lemnotis family, who opened it in March of 2018. However, the Lemnotis’ have owned businesses in New Britain since 1949.

“It always made sense to stay in New Britain for us,” Christina Caccioppoli, Five Churches Brewing partner said. She then went on to describe the location of the brewery. “It’s a second story tap room. It has nice big windows so you can actually see five churches on the skyline of New Britain, so that’s where the name came from.”

Five Churches Brewing had wanted to work with Central in some capacity since they opened, since both are located in New Britain. In 2019, Cody Collins, the new General Manager of Central’s athletics department reached out to the brewery.

“Coming in here, I understood as a fairly recent college graduate that college students love three things,” Collins said. “Alcohol, food and entertainment.”

Collins said that once he began the partnership with Caccioppoli, he knew it was the right move.

“I knew right away it made too much sense not to do something, with how close Five Churches is to the university and just how the family ties roll in,” Collins said. “I knew we had something brewing, no pun intended.”

There is a kickoff party for the beer scheduled for Thursday, March 12 at Five Churches Brewery at 5 p.m.

“I’m really excited to now kick off this partnership that’s been in the works for the past six months, so it’s gonna be great,” Collins said. “And I know at Central, the community outreach to the togetherness of this new beverage is gonna be next level.”