Mick Kern appears courtesy of Live From Wayne Gretzky’s
Tuesday, January 13th, 2009
Air Canada Centre
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
Nashville Predators vs. Toronto Maple Leafs
- rather frigid evening. Decided to forgo the Big Mac in favour of Subway. Then took the subway down to the A.C.C. The Predators were in town tonight; crowd milling around outside the arena looked like any other Toronto NHL hockey crowd, large and expectant.
- fumbled for my media pass. At first, felt slightly guilty for being able to take in games without having to pay. At the end of this evening, would consider myself blessed.
- made my way through the winding corridors in the bowels of the arena. Path takes one by both dressing rooms. Brad May of the Maple Leafs was out early, working on his stick. The ushers held us up, as the Predators lumbered out of their room, en route to the ice for the pre-game warm-up.
- up close, in their gleaming white road uniforms, the Predators looked like a squadron of Star Wars storm troopers. Jordan Tootoo, who would not play that night, was in full uniform, and from ten feet away, looked like a kid. Actually, so did most of the players. As they stood there in the corridor, waiting for the signal to go out for the warm-up, they could have been a bunch of ten-year-olds, eager to hit the ice.
- a couple of guys shouted rah-rah encouragements back-and-forth…someone cracked a joke about wanting to get out there and see all the Wade Belak jersey’s in the crowd (it was Belak’s first game back in Toronto since being moved at last season’s trade deadline to the Panthers), that joke was a hit with the players…David Legwand went around slapping all the guy’s shin pads with his stick, just before they took to the ice.
- good to know even professional hockey players also look like it’s ten minutes to midnight on New Year’s Eve when they have to balance themselves on their skate blades while waiting to take to the ice.
- Steve Sullivan among those Predators, returning to one of his former haunts. Way up high in the press box, a number of scribes are exchanging stories about how Sullivan really injured himself during his Toronto days…by unloading the dishwasher. Note to self to use this as an excuse the next time the wife gives me grief after I forget to unload our dishwasher.
- Notice in the game notes that Dan Hamhuis of the Predators has now played 324 career games, the third most of the 2001 draft class, trailing just Ilya Kovalchuk and Ales Hemsky.
- pre-game warmup is always an interesting creature to watch. What is really accomplished, except to get the blood flowing? Each NHL team that I’ve seen appears to approach warmup the exact same way; shoot the puck at the goalie, do some two-on-ones, then suddenly everyone skates around their half of the ice in a frenzy. It’s like watching a flock of birds; they’re all flying in one direction, when, without warning, they all dart off in unison another way. There is order to their dance, but it remains a mystery to those on the outside, watching.
- pregame warmup is over. Antti Pihlstrom is the last off the ice for Nashville; Curtis Joseph waits for his teammates to all exit, then he is the last Leaf off.
- This will be the only meeting this season between the Predators and the Maple Leafs.
- Unless they meet in the Stanley Cup Final.
- during the National Anthem’s, the in-house camera lingers on the face of Brad May, standing at the Leafs’ bench. He appears to be soaking in the entire atmosphere.
- 7:39 pm est – the game is underway.
- just over my left shoulder, one half-level up, sits Tom Callahan, doing play-by-play for Nashville radio. His voice dips and rises with the play unfolding below us. It has almost a dreamy quality to it. Takes me back to when I was ten, lying in bed at night, listening to Rod Phillips call Edmonton Oilers game on my transistor radio.
- a late-arriving crowd tonight. Not that many people could be in the foyer, downing shrimp.
- puck appears to be bouncing tonight. A couple of early chances, for both teams, were not-to-be thanks to the dancing disc.
- one of the Maple Leafs’ fancy composite sticks breaks early in the first period. This would be a recurring theme all night, particularly for the Predators.
- not much of a first period.
- second period gets underway at 8:27 pm est.
- from what can I see tonight, there’s still a fair amount of cross-checking going on in the front of the net. Cross-checks that don’t get called. Make of that what you will, but don’t think that the officials have taken physical contact out of the game. That’s not true, or at least it isn’t tonight.
- attendance announced as being 19,223. Most appear to finally be in their seats.
- frankly, at the halfway mark of this game, the only way to describe it is…boring.
- Nashville gets caught with too many men on the ice. Steve Sullivan serves the bench minor. He played five shifts in the first period (2:45 of playing time), and would get on for seven shifts in the second. Maybe after the long layoff, he needed the rest. Not that he looks like Mats Sundin out there. Sullivan actually has some zip in his step.
- okay, some apparently Toronto is the centre of the hockey universe, or so many would argue, including myself. So why is it everytime they have another one of those lame in-house contests on the scoreboard, the A.C.C. staff have to find the biggest hoser in the building? The biggest Canadian beer-swilling hick who somehow got his paws on a ticket? Often wonder what the out-of-town media think about these contestants? So much for the sophistication of Canadian hockey fans.
- it is around this point in the game where the Nashville composite sticks begin to break with alarming frequency.
- with about 1:14 left in the second period, Martin Erat and Ian White exchange some heated words. Maybe the first sign of life all evening, if one disregards the in-house hoser contests.
- third period gets underway at 9:19 pm est.
- with the score still 0-0, so much for that theory that a hockey game doesn’t need any goals to be exciting. A goal or two would be the only thing to liven up this stiff of a game.
- hey, yet another broken Nashville stick.
- finally, a goal!
- Steve Sullivan makes a couple of nifty moves to cut in front of the Toronto net, and unloads a shot that finds the back of the twine, at the 14:27 mark. Even though it’s the visiting team, a large number of Toronto fans cheer. Yes, Sullivan has about 25 family members in the crowd, yes he was a fan favourite when he played for the Leafs, and yes people appreciate all he’s done to come back from injury, but really, the cheering was for the realization that, hey, we’re actually at a hockey game. Someone finally scored. It might be the only chance we get all evening to make some noise on our own, without being urged on by the scoreboard.
- it’s Sullivan’s first goal of the season. A nice story.
- well, it was a nice story. A few minutes later, the official scorer looks at the video, and sees that the puck hits Radek Bonk on the way in. When the scoring change is announced, it elicits the second-loudest booing of the game.
- during another time-out, the predictable “hug cam” is presented on the video screen on the centre-ice scoreboard. And predictably, it finds its way to the Predators’ bench, where Greg Zanon hugs Wade Belak, much to the delight of the crowd. Maybe the loudest cheer of the evening.
- another goal! This time, David Legwand snaps a beautiful wrister past Vesa Toskala. Which begs the question, why can’t Legwand do more of this? Watching this game unfold, one can easily pick out Legwand. He’s got the moves. It’s only his tenth goal this season. 2-0 Nashville. This game is as good as over. Some fans begin to boo.
- notice on the out-of-town scoreboard that the Bruins beat the Canadiens 3-1. Watching that score all night was about as exciting as the game being played in front of me. Which begs the question, why can’t an arena have a hand-operated scoreboard, much like Fenway Park?
- with 2:10 left in the third period, the Maple Leaf faithful ain’t so faithful, and begin to loudly boo the home team. When the Leafs take a late penalty, the booing intensifies.
- only question now is whether-or-not Pekka Rinne will pick up the shutout for Nashville. The Leafs pull their goalie with 35 seconds left, but to no avail. Rinne picks up his 10th win.
- what’s left of the crowd cheers as Steve Sullivan is announced as the third star. Shea Weber gets second star, and Rinne (even though he had a relatively easy night) is the first star.
- as the arena empties, and the television crews finish up their broadcasts, someone somewhere pulls the A.C.C. fire alarm. No-one seems to care.
- Mick Kern
Mick Kern appears courtesy of Live From Wayne Gretzky’s
