Nov. 24/03 -
The NHL’s first outdoor game - and its accompanying “MegaStars” game, featuring the likes of Wayne Gretzky and Guy LaFleur – has been declared a smashing success by all concerned. Even the players, initially wary of taking to the ice at minus-3 Fahrenheit, gave their approval. "It was a great experience," Ty Conklin of the Oilers told the Edmonton Sun, and as the losing goaltender, he probably had the least fun of anyone on Saturday night.
What was there not to like? A brilliant sheet of ice; a collection of millionaire athletes freezing their butts off; the late afternoon sun giving way to the frigid winter’s night; the air of nostalgia surrounding the entire day. It was quite a sight, fit for a greeting card. In this setting, the NHL’s Heritage Classic could not help but succeed.
So powerfully did the mise en scene resonate with the hockey faithful, that people came away thinking the games themselves were much better than they actually were.
Like most old-timers’ events, the much-anticipated MegaStars Game demonstrated why hockey is a young man’s pursuit. The headliners – Gretzky, Kurri, Messier, LaFleur – were inconspicuous. There were just two goals, neither involving big names. At least a few fans must have noted the delicious irony when one of those goals came from the hands of Marty McSorley, more MegaGoon than MegaStar, a man who just a few years ago was publicly flayed as the incarnation of Everything That’s Wrong With Hockey.
But nobody goes to an old-timers’ game to see the game. They go to celebrate and reminisce. The pre-game introductions, number-99 back in an Oilers’ uniform, LaFleur in his toque, Paul Coffey shovelling snow from the ice during the break – such sights alone were worth the price of admission.
What is more interesting is the reaction to the second game – the real game, with two points in the NHL standings at stake. For the current Oilers and Canadiens, making a run for the playoffs is tough enough without having to deal with frozen gloves and numbed toes. For many of them, holding down a steady NHL job is a daily challenge. Asked to do so in sub-zero temperatures, they went about their business with almost no complaint.
The ice, made brittle by the extreme cold, cracked and chipped beneath them, causing the puck to bounce like an Indian rubber ball. After the first five minutes of each period, it was almost impossible to complete a pass or pull off a deft stickhandling move. Faced with these difficulties (in fairness, the ice was probably no worse than Dallas in June) the Oilers and Habs played a spirited affair, but hardly an exceptional hockey game.
But as a spectacle, with its evening shadows and snow piled up behind the boards, it was marvellous. As a result, everyone went home thinking “great game!”
Even the dean of Canadian hockey writers was fooled by the façade:
“Whether it was the bitter cold or the inspiration of the old-timers, the players in the second game, the real game, played increasingly more efficiently than usual,” wrote Roy MacGregor in the Toronto Globe and Mail. “The colder it got, the quicker it got and the better it got — until a game broke out that has rarely been seen indoors this year, including a winning goal in Montreal's 4-3 victory by Richard Zednik of a type we had come to believe was played out only in children's imaginations and outdoor rinks.”
In fact, Saturday’s outdoor match featured fairly typical NHL hockey, better than some games that have been played indoors this year, worse than others. Zednik's game-winner was a nice goal, though much nicer ones were scored at other NHL rinks throughout the week.
Watching the outdoor game and feeling the soul stir at the sight of it all, more than one hockey fan probably asked, “why can’t they play like this more often?” They do. They do it all the time. But they have never before done it against the looming backdrop of the prairie darkness, with stocking caps pulled over their heads and towers of steam billowing from every goal-mouth scramble. Play the exact same game in some generic, half-full arena in Florida, and how can it ever hold up by comparison?
As an event, the NHL's first outdoor game lived up to - and in many ways exceeded – the hype, no small accomplishment in today’s hyperbolized sports culture. But as a hockey game, it's a reminder to the NHL that pro hockey is not just about goals and saves and superstars. It's about theatre and drama.
