American Hockey Fan

As I've mentioned, I'm heading to the Ice Bowl up in Buffalo on New Year's day, and we're flying to Buffalo tomorrow.

If anybody has any leads on NHL related New Year's parties, I'm all ears. As it stands now, the plan is pretty much to look up Rob Ray in the phone book, then show up at his house with a couple cases of Labatts.

For now, I'm off to go shopping for long underwear, a seat cushion and what else- perhaps a discreet flask? I've never been in an NFL stadium in cold weather before.

Any tips on what else I'll need?

Ice Bowl!

These guys are killing me.

I mean, really- they are fucking killing me.

I had a group of people over at my apartment tonight, and we all watched the Patriots secure an undefeated season.

When I was home for Christmas, I watched the premiere of the NESN special of the Red Sox Championship.

A few nights ago, I was up late and watched the Celtics dominate the Seattle Supersonics. Do you know what a supersonic is? I don't. Fuck it, it doesn't matter, the Celtics are great these days.

I'm watching the game on DVR right now, and the Bruins are down 5-0.

Christ.

Really? You're going to lose 6 in a row?

I mean, how hard would it be for the Bruins to not totally suck?

Would that be tough?

Jesus.

This sucks.

I'm going to the Ice bowl!

After all of the crap, after all of the problems, I'm going to the goddamn ice bowl!

For those of you who have been living in a cave, and by living in a cave I mean, regularly getting your sports coverage from say, ESPN, you might have no idea that on New Years Day at 1:00 PM, the Pittsburgh Penguins will be facing off against the Buffalo Sabres in first outdoor regular season game in NHL history. It will be happening in the stadium where the Buffalo Bills play, and you can see some nifty pics of them building the rink here.

For my part, I can't believe I'm this excited to go to Buffalo in January. I mean, Jesus.

It's been a tough ticket to get, and if you have a couple hundred bucks you can still get in, but I managed to snag one at face value through the time honored technique of "knowin' a guy who knows a guy." In this case, the guy is my buddy Jack, Buffalo fan and occasional contributor to AHF. Anyway, Jack will be covering the event for Deadspin, and I'll be covering the event right here.Oh, and by "covering" I actually mean "drunkenly trying to type up a recap while wearing woolen mittens saturated with frozen buffalo wing sauce."

It should be a good time.

-the morning before his five goal game, Marian Gaborik watched a YouTube clip of Pavel Bure's five goal performance against Finland in the 1998 Olympics.

From the article:

In a coincidence nearly as unbelievable as his record-setting performance, which was the first time a Wild player scored more than three times, Gaborik spent a few minutes in the morning watching online clips of Pavel Bure's five-goal game for Russia against Finland in the semifinals of the 1998 Olympics in Nagano, Japan.

"My buddies sent me a YouTube video," Gaborik said, smiling.

It looks to me like 1988 predates the era of fantastic Finnish goaltenders, but just in case there's any good luck left in it, here the clip he watched:



If something good happens to you today after watching that, drop us a line. And if Gaborik can watch a video of a guy scoring five goals in a game then go out and do it, my guess is the next Youtube clip he'll be mimicking is this one:



Matter of time.

Game of the year.

Wow-

I mean, fucking WOW.

What a hockey game.

Bruins/Penguins, each team scores four unanswered goals.

Gordie Howe Hat trick for Sid the Kid, and the Bruins make a game of it!

Sad to see the shootout end the fun so quickly, but boy oh boy.

And how about this Lucic kid?

I'm sure some of you are worried about how the recent flareup in practice between Aaron Asham and coach Brent Sutter is going to affect chemistry in the Devils' dressing room.

Well, not to worry. Asham and Sutter still haven't discussed their shouting match, but according to Tom Gulitti's outstanding Fire & Ice blog, no more need be said:

"He knows my opinion on things and the way I feel about stuff," Sutter said.

With honest, open dialog like that, what could go wrong?

Dec 1, 2007 (CNN) - Philadelphia Flyers fans indicate their
displeasure at the placement of a faceoff following a puck
shot out of play during the third period of a game against
the Dallas Stars at the Wachovia Center on Saturday.

Hey kids, feel free to add your own in the comments (and click the thumbnail for video)!