Posted on 10/06/2011 5:10:58 AM PDT by airborne
NHL opens its 95th season tomorrow night with spotlight on Winnipeg return, B's Cup defense
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Rules revisions, rink modifications reflect League's focus on player safety
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
NEW YORK/TORONTO - The first Stanley Cup banner raising in Boston in 39 years, the first National Hockey League regular-season game in Winnipeg in 15 years and the first NHL regular-season game ever played in Germany will be among the highlights when the NHL launches its 2011-12 season with a four-day celebration beginning Thursday night.
The 1,230-game, 185-day regular season gets off to a rousing start with a coast-to-coast North American triple-header that includes the Boston Bruins beginning their 2011 Stanley Cup championship defense against Philadelphia. The other games feature an "Original Six" showdown between Montreal and Toronto and a meeting between Pittsburgh and Vancouver.
The spotlight shifts across the Atlantic Ocean Friday and Saturday, when the Anaheim Ducks, Buffalo Sabres, Los Angeles Kings and New York Rangers play four games in three European capitals -- including the historic Sabres-Kings game Saturday in Berlin. The final team opener of the season will mark the return of the NHL to Winnipeg when the Jets host the Canadiens Sunday.
Amid the pageantry, the NHL's continued focus on player safety will be reflected by changes to the rules and the playing environment. Expansions and revisions have been made to the rules governing boarding and checks to the head, while the changes to the environment include the elimination of seamless glass and the introduction of curved glass at the ends of players' benches.
What follows is a synopsis of the major changes, highlights and important facts media and fans should know going into the 2011-12 NHL season:
(Excerpt) Read more at nhl.com ...
I know I must be a strange gal... other women adore “figure skating”. (I hate figure skating personally). For graceful moves on ice, no one beats hockey players. A 6’6” man can skate forwards, suddenly skate backwards and turn on a dime. To me, that is grace on ice.
PING!!
>>The strike near the end of the 91-92 season ended my love affair with the NY Rangers and the NHL.
That’s too bad. I stopped watching for a long while after the NHL moved my team to Carolina. I’m a bit younger, started watching WHA in the early 70s when I was a kid and kept up with the Whalers till they left in 1997. Then hockey was dead to me for ~6 years, but I started watching again in California (of all places) and started playing in adult leagues.
Can you please add me? Thought I was on but doesn’t appear that I am. Thanks
Clear The Track For Eddie Shack
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QqvNfez5zBA
He was also called “The Entertainer”
You might get a kick out of this TV show:
Watching NHL enforcers figure-skate is impressive...seriously!
Say what?
Broad Street Bullies?
Maurice Richard and the multiple riots (caused by cheap shots both on him and by him) in the 60s....
Go Stars!
My experience is roughly parallel. I'm pretty sure my father took me to my first Ranger game in '53 or so. (I was seven years old.) We would go to four or five games a year. I even had a couple of my birthday parties at the Garden. Once I was old enough to go into the city (from LI) by myself (11 or 12 years old) I started going to games with my friends too. Sometimes we would use our G.O. cards to get fifty cent admission to the upstairs side arena (where you could only see from the first row - behind that you only could see about two thirds of the ice).
I figured out when tickets would go on sale, and would go into NYC when sales would open up so I could virtually select my seats: usually Side Promenade, Section S, Row A, Seats 1 & 2, right up against the glass next to the visitors bench. Sometimes Bill Cullen beat me to those seats! And they were really next to the visitor's bench. There was no separation at all. I loved the old Garden. I can still see everything about it in my mind's eye.
When I was in college, and almost commuting between Troy, NY, and NYC, the "new" Garden opened. My father got season tickets, first in 305 in the green, and then 101 in the orange, to entice me to come back to NYC even more often. (By then my parents had moved to Manhattan.) I continued to attend about 30 games a year from Troy, and then from Hartford where I landed my first job out of college.
But then things went south. I don't know if it was Vic Hadfield laughing in the penalty box as the Rangers were losing the Stanley Cup Finals or Brad Park tripping over the blue line on a regular basis, but I started to realize that I was watching other people work, and paying to do it too. Brad Park never came to watch me write computer programs. I cared more about the games than the players did. It was just stupid.
So I stopped going.
I still love hockey. I think it's a great game, and it's great to watch when the players play with the enthusiasm of eight year-olds. College games are like that. Maybe the last two rounds of the Stanley Cup Playoffs are like that too, Vic Hadfield notwithstanding. And for some reason the outdoor New Year's game is too. I see this year the Rangers will be playing the Flyers down in Philly on January 2nd. Maybe I'll go.
ML/NJ
It is easy once you get the hang of it. I remember thinking at times, that if G-d had it to do over again, he might just give us skates and an ice-like surface to get around on.
ML/NJ
“It’s easy once you get the hang of it”
Then you have talent. I can barely walk in high heels anymore. I skated as a kid (not gracefully mind you). I am afraid that gift was just not given to me. BUT, I do appreciate and enjoy watching others with that gift.
For Sunday night games, we arrived at the Garden at 3PM for the 50 cents tickets. One guy would wait by the doors on 49th ST. and the other would be by the ticket window. Tickets went on sale 1/2 hour before they opened the doors. Once they opened we would race up the escalators and either grab front row, second row (you could sit on the railing between rows and see the whole ice) or shoot up to the corners. We took turns doing this as there was usually 5 or 6 of us at the games. Got in MANY fights saving those seats for the late comers. LOL
Remember playing foot hockey on the stair well landings with crushed beer cans for pucks? How about the black guy who used to come around with the "scoring pool" or the fellow with the gold jacket and trombone?
One of our crew had a relative that used to get good seats occassionally in the same box as the organ. Gladys Gooding gave me "one up side the head" with her cane when she caught me lighting up a cigarette. LOL!!!
Another fond memory, this from the new Garden.
Our seats were in 421, next to last row in the blue, behind the Flag. Monteal is in town and Canada had JUST made “Oh, Canada” its national anthem. One of our guys (we had a whole row) had Xeroxed up enough copies of the lyrics to pass out to the whole section. The Garden only had a recording of the music...no words. Well once the music started we started singing. The Monteal players were craning their necks trying to see who it was singing the song. Whole Garden gave us a standing O.
Go Sabres: “Hockey Heaven” on the Lake.
And for Lakeshark: Go Wings
It’s the most wonderful time of the year!!!!!!!!!!
Go Pens TORCH Vancouver......oh already done, well beat them anyway.
Also Go Blue Jackets will be there opening night!
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.