E-Mail This Article to a Friend Tim Schofield Even in defeat, the runner-up scored a win by helping his district reaffirm its progressive roots BY DAVID S. BERNSTEIN

IT TURNS OUT there were plenty of progressives. Conventional wisdom had it that there weren’t enough liberal voters in the 18th Suffolk District to support two progressive candidates — Tim Schofield and Mike Moran — in the Democratic primary. They would split the vote, leading to a win for Yankee conservative Greg Glennon. That line of thinking led some, like Melissa Kogut, executive director of NARAL Pro-Choice Massachusetts, to endorse Moran — a move for which Kogut made no apologies as she helped celebrate his victory at the Stockyard, in Brighton, on Tuesday night.

But that line of thinking was wrong. There were so many liberal votes, Moran and Schofield split them almost evenly and still left Glennon (and also-ran Joe Walsh) in the dust. "Nobody believed how progressive this district was," said Schofield, after delivering his concession speech at the Kells, in Allston. "We told them it was there, historically."

It’s possible the conventional wisdom scared enough potential Schofield voters into marking Moran on their ballots to help turn this close race. It’s also possible that Howie Carr’s ugly Boston Herald column denigrating Schofield’s support among Boston University students (a column that Moran, to his credit, sternly denounced when it was mentioned to him) alerted some homophobic voters to Schofield’s sexual orientation. Most likely, though, Schofield could do only so much in his first campaign in a district where he was almost completely unknown.

The solid crowd of about 100 supporters at the Kells — young, good-looking, munching on crab Rangoon and spareribs, and, yes, some sporting BU logos — was not downcast over the loss. Most seemed to have positive opinions about Moran. Certainly Schofield had kind words for the victor — he and Moran apparently bonded for much of the day in front of a Brookline polling place.

Schofield voters may have lost, but they did something important to forestall the concern they expressed most often to me at the Kells on Tuesday: whether there is sincerity behind Moran’s stated progressive beliefs. By voting in such numbers for Schofield, they showed that Moran needs to watch out for a challenge from his left, not his right. That should keep him true to his liberal promises, and that’s a big success indeed.

David S. Bernstein can be reached at dbernstein[a]phx.com