So, my poor Rangers lost a heartbreaker last night when Sergei “I’m So Old That I Played In The Miracle On Ice Game -- For The Commies” Fedorov scored a goal late in the third period. I console myself with the fact that the Devils lost, too.
Ah, hockey. I played it in the frozen backyard of Jimmy Stevens as a lad in The Ancestral Homeland, cheered as new Ranger Phil Esposito battled his old teammate Bobby Orr on TV, and pretended I was Rocket Richard on the rare occasions when my older brothers allowed me to play as the Canadiens on the slot-hockey game we had in the basement. (Being stuck playing the Maple Leafs gave me a degree of sympathy for the white and blue that remains to this day.)
I drifted away from the game, though, after the move. The fact that hockey lost a national broadcast deal around the same time didn’t help. I rediscovered the game much later, when I was channel surfing and happened upon the playoffs one year on ESPN. It was 1993, the year that Montreal and Los Angeles battled for the Cup, and Patrick Roy hooked me. And the following year, my Rangers ended the “1940!” chants when Mark Messier picked them up and carried them into victory. Ever since, no matter who is in the playoffs, I love this time of year. I like it a lot better, of course, when a team (or player) I like wins, but the game itself makes up for the fact that the hated Red Wings win too often, or that the thuggish Devils seem to do well (but not this year!) in the playoffs.
At any rate, with the Rangers out, I need to find a new team to pull for. There are plenty of options, but I think that I am leaning towards the Blackhawks.
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2 comments:
Why is it that my sports nut wife loves to watch all things sports on tv, except hockey, the one team sport that I like to watch?
BTW, hockey in high def is like watching a different sport.
You are so right on the HD thing – my cable provider doesn’t offer the HD version of one of the channels that the games have been on, and the difference is striking.
Re the spouse, does she complain that she can’t follow the puck? My wife used to be the same way until she saw a couple of games live in seats relatively close to the ice. The first time she went, we had seats in the stratosphere, and she hated it. It was a long time before I convinced her to try again, and she ended up going with me to a game that I had managed to score some seats within a few rows of the ice. (No, I didn’t pay $300 -- our local team sucked that year, it was a weekday game against someone like Phoenix, and so I paid well under face value for the pair.) She enjoyed it, and we went to a few more games together. She’s not what I would call a hockey fanatic, but now she doesn’t mind watching playoff games with me.
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