A Night at the A.C.C.

As I mentioned yesterday, last night was spent at the Air Canada Centre in Toronto. After a week long stay visiting family in the area, I was relieved to be taking in some sporting action while in the city. As it happened, my uncle had purchased 6 tickets for the Leafs-Rangers for some of my family and I. We had great seats, and what transpired was great for me to watch.

The fact that we had amazing seats (no easy feat to accomplish at the A.C.C. I might mention) made the experience all the more memorable. Although the case could be made that one has never truly experienced a sporting event if they haven’t resided in the upper tier of the arena/field for a full game. In this situation though, the great seats made the atmosphere perfect for me (a Rangers fan in Toronto), because if I had been yelling some of the things I was saying in the upper deck, I might have been taken to the back stairwell and abused ruthlessly.

Because the Blue and Red dominated each and every aspect of the game, I was able to attack the home town faithfuls endlessly because they had no comeback whatsoever. This year especially, the Leafs really blow, so I had full reign to cheer and root on New York as I pleased. I must say though, the atmosphere in Toronto is electric. I mean these men and women really love their hockey. I mean it’s Canada, come on, what did you expect. But even when their team was down 5-0 in the third, I’d say roughly 4/5 of the arena was still packed in and cheering. An impressive feat, I don’t think I’ve seen anywhere else recently. I mean the equivalent of being down Cinco-Nil in hockey is like a 25 point blow out in basketball, or going up three scores in pigskin. Utter embarasment really. And finally when the Leafs scored their first goal, the place erupted as if they had just won a shootout or something. My hat’s off to them, because I know a disgraceful performance like that in New York would not be stood for. Especially by people like yours truly and Barney. Overall, a solid night with the fam, that translated into an excellent feeling to be a New York sports fan (for a change).