Pipers lead the Way

Having waited almost an hour I decided to wait and get a picture with my old buddy Stanley and Brian Burke. The line moved quite quickly and at one point Brian Burke took a little baby and put him in the bowl which drew some oohs and ahhs from the crowd. While waiting in line I spoke with one of the organizers and he told me they were expecting 300-400 people but it looks like more than 1500 people had shown up. Once my turn came up I received a nice handshake and shared a few words with Brian Burke, had a picture taken and I was off into the crowd.

Once outside I saw how enormous the lineup was and I was glad I decided to come a little early. I was talking to someone and they mentioned how special it was for the Cup to come to Chilliwack and they wondered why it was not brought into Vancouver. I said maybe it was a way for Brian Burke to rub it in to the Vancouver Canucks.

Personally I think it was a nice gesture on Brian Burke’s part to bring the Cup for a visit. Thanks Brian

The Official Annoucement

Thanks to the The Toque for the announcement and oh I cannot forget Leafs Suck!

I lived in Manitoba from ages 9 through 14 and my most vivid memories comes from those cold crisp days of winter. Most days we looked forward to getting home from school and loved a new snowfall, all the better to play hockey. As soon as we were home from school we would get the nets out and the shovels so we could clean the snow off the road to play our game. It was not very long before we were picking teams and there was never a lack of players. We would be out on the street no matter what the weather, no matter how cold it got we would play every night until we were dragged in for dinner. Of course after dinner we were back out for more games playing till we were called in for the night. I think if we had a choice we would have stayed out and played hockey all day and night.

Most days we could be found out on the street with the only breaks for meals and an occasional nature break. The conversation was interspersed with calls of “He Shoots He Scores” to the inevitable call of “Car” as we waited for the cars to clear our play area. Many future NHLer’s plied their trade on those streets, well at least in our minds we were future NHL players. With my Boston Bruins shirt I was Bobby Orr rushing up the side to score another spectacular goal.

One day was different from the rest, on Saturdays we would be out early to the rink for a day of games and skating then home. But this day would be different as 6pm rolled around we would hear Canada’s second National Anthem which signaled that our favourite show was about to start. Hockey Night in Canada was and is an institution which brought the family together for many Saturday nights. Some of my fondest memories comes from those cold crisp days playing road hockey and rushing in on a Saturday to be in front of the TV in time to watch my heroes play the great game.

I would love to hear from other collectors.

Jersey Collection Page

This year for some reason I went nuts and entered 6 pools, normally I will go into 1 or 2 different pools. The funny thing is while it would be nice to win ie. Bragging Rights, I really don’t care and definitely do not watch a game to see how many points a player gets unless of course it is a Calgary player. Something I cannot stand is someone who watches hockey and all they care about is how many points a player from their pool choices gets on a particular night. Don’t tell me about it I do not care I watch the games for the pure enjoyment of watching the game.

During the lead up to the opening of the season all the experts and fans alike have been trying to figure out will play well, which teams will improve and conversely which will falter. While I am a Flames fan and want my team to win it all, I also realize that no matter what all the prognosticators say before the season, as soon as the puck drops all bets are off and any team can win on any night. 

Having said all that I believe the Calgary Flames will be the big winners and bring Lord Stanley back to Calgary.

I arrived at 6pm for a scheduled 7pm game start and wandered around the rink waiting patiently for the festivities to start. As the start time grew close I was surprised to see lots of people still wandering and not really seeing anything happening to indicate that some sort of ceremony was going to take place. About 5 minutes to seven an announcement was made indicating all the lights in the building would be turned out at 7pm. So I proceeded to my Standing room place to prepare to watch the show. At 7pm the lights dropped and the TV cameras came on to show the Shaw broadcast team along with the Bruins Play by Play team. This was shown on the Scoreboard with the sound a little tough to understand making it sound like jumble of unintelligible sounds. This went on for 10 minutes , then 20 minutes and the crowd was growing restless with sporadic cheering. Finally after almost 40 minutes of waiting in the dark trying to understand what was being broadcast without any luck, four fireworks rockets were set off which I guess was designed to wake up the fans. With this the Player introductions began, each Chilliwack Player was introduced and they skated onto the ice through what I thought was supposed to be a fireworks light bar to light up their entrance. This did not to work as planned and only after 7 players had entered did the light bar finally go off and then only for two players. Also during the this process the scoreboard was displaying a Bruins logo and even though there were TV cameras on the ice the clock remained dark until almost three quarters of the team had been introduced then suddenly the picture was broadcast for all to see. After all the players were introduced the opponents for the evening the Kelowna Rockets hit the ice and we had the Ceremonial First Puck drop and a series of sparklers which were located around the top of the glass were fired off with only half of the sparklers going off. Finally after taking about 5 minutes with ladders all over the ice to take down sparklers and clean up the ice the game began. Don’t get me wrong I am not complaining it is just that I figured this would be a little more professionally put together and a little bit smoother.

The game itself was a good back and forth affair with Chilliwack scoring first and taking a 3-0 lead into the third period. While Kelowna did break the shutout bid of Alex Archibald with a goal midway through the third period. The style and pace of the game was excellent making it well worth attending to see the game. With the excitement with which this team plays it will be well worth it to see more games this season whether the Bruins win or not it will be a good brand of hockey.

The action continued right till the end of the third period with Chilliwack besting Kamloops 6-4. The overall tempo was quick and with the exception of lots of penalties for interference, hooking and holding and of course the occasional fight tthe game maintained a good flow. The players are getting used to the enforcement of the rules such as was seen last year in the NHL. It reminded me of the NHL games I attended early last season and how the penalties seemed to be endless. As the season continues and the players adjust the penalties will allow the games to speed up as has happened with the NHL games.

A few players that stood out and I will continue to watch (if they stick around) include Oscar Moller from Sweden and Josh Aspenlind both of whom played a fast pitched exciting game. As the team comes together I think this will be an exciting team to watch. More to come.

I have been interested to watch and listen on the local media to all the rhetoric about how great the Vancouver Canucks will be this season. The Canucks have made massive changes from the coach to new forwards, some new defense and what has been the missing component for a long time, a top goalie. While the inclusion of Roberto Luongo should help Vancouver he has not won in the playoffs and has never lead the league such as Martin Brodeur, Eddie Belfour (in his prime), and Dominik Hasek. Each of these goalies has led the league and their teams to victory including winning the Stanley Cup. Well some may believe that Luongo never had a good supporting cast in Florida (I think the cast last year was quite good and getting better) the team in front of him in Vancouver is very different from last years entry and their will probably be an issue with team chemistry for the first part if not the majority of the season. Yes you can look at stats and say the players they lost were minus players and the players they added were all pluses last season but their is also team chemistry which goes way beyond individual stats. Luongo needs to lead the Canucks no matter how the team plays and he needs to steal victories on nights when the team does not show up. In the very tough Western Conference a team will not be able to take very many nights off or they will find themselves out of playoff contention very quickly.

As for my team the Calgary Flames the changes have been to help with the biggest shortfall last season lack of scoring. To add scoring the Flames did not have to kill team chemistry to add Alex Tanguay and Jeff Freisen should help Calgary score more goals. With the solid defense and most of the same forwards Calgary will again be in contention with of course Mikka Kiprusoff backstopping the team. Maybe even Tony Amonte will wake up and add to the goal production, if not I suspect GM Sutter will give him a Bus ticket out of town.

Having said all that Hockey is full of surprises and anything is possible. Should be an interesting season. Found this picture somewhere I thought it was quite well done, it is amazing what a little paint can do…..

and I haven’t forgotten about the so called “Center of the Universe” Toronto Maple Leafs, I just haven’t really heard much about them, much good that is…..

While my team Calgary has already traded for Alex Tanguay they still need some more scoring help. I do not think they will dig too deep into the free agent market as they have most of what it takes to go a long way in next playoffs as long as they get some scoring from the current crop as well as a couple of additions. It would be nice if Calgary could pickup another scorer without having to break the bank. Although I think he is an ass, Jeremy Roenick has indicated he wants to play for a Canadian team and if he has his head screwed on right he might be helpful on the scoring front. Should be an interesting couple of days as the teams make their moves.

To hear that Luongo is the best goalie in the world (yes I am not exaggerating that was what was said) is a complete misnomer until he leads his team to the playoffs and continues to carry his team on nights when they do not show up. Time will tell whether he can be described as the world’s best goalie but at this point he needs to prove he is the best by carrying the Canucks far into the playoffs and be the backstop that everyone is talking about. Just saying that he is the best is not good enough, he needs to put up or everyone needs to shut up.

Check out Andrew Coyne’s excellent Hockey Article.