Physicality isn’t part of hockey?
News flash for ya - neither is biting another player’s finger (with no penalty or suspension). Neither is trying to decapitate one of your opponent’s star players, especially when he doesn’t even have the puck anymore.
Canucks started the rough stuff, and now they want to complain about it? They were up 2-0 in games, Boston was sleeping, and they woke them up with the Horton attempted-assassination. WHY??
I began watching hockey in 1975 when I moved up here to New England, and got hooked. I began to play goal in men’s leagues when I got out of the Navy and played for 15 years...
I was really into it, all my buddies were. The Adams Division rivalries, Montreal, Quebec, etc just made it a blast.
Then the game began to change with the trap, the restructuring of the divisions and such, and by the late nineties, I simply could not watch it anymore. They took all the intensity and fun out of it for me. Here is what the game seemed like to me in the nineties:
Faceoff.
Puck in the corner. Grapple. Grasp. Struggle. Muck. Clutch. Grab. Whistle.
Faceoff.
Icing. Whistle.
Faceoff.
Puck out of play. Whistle.
Faceoff.
Skate through the neutral zone. Offside. Whistle.
Faceoff.
Shot. Goalie ties up puck. Whistle.
REPEAT.
The game became so mind numbingly boring I couldn’t bear to watch it.
I have only watched infrequent games this decade, but when I began watching the Montreal-Boston series, I was amazed at how different the game was. So much faster, no whistles.
But when I saw Thomas lay the lumber on that guy, I could see the heart of the game still existed...:)
I would still rather watch a physical game rather than a finesse game. But that is me. Some people like it the other way around.