Hockey Night From Canada

I have an admission to make: I am a team sports fan. However, I've been away from the games in recent months. The action, the franchises, the players just weren't compelling enough to watch.

Last night was a different and refreshing experience. Ironically, I wasn't feeling well, so I turned on the Stanley Cup ice hockey finals. This was the fifth game of a seven-game event, with the series tied. The series featured the Boston Bruins (an "Original Six" team) and the Vancouver Canucks, one of the NHL's "expansion" success stories.

A Canadian team in the championship round of Canada's national sport gives this Stanley Cup competition special flavor. (The Cup is shown in the photo.) Hockey is our northern cousin's shared passion. I got a taste of this sentiment when I hitchhiked through Western Canada a generation ago. One of my rides came from a family that lived outside Vancouver. We began a conversation, and as I paid attention to the NHL at the time, I could easily talk about the teams and players. I told them about my first game as an NHL spectator, a playoff game in the old Madison Square Garden between the New York Rangers and a Montreal Canadiens squad captained by the great Jean Beliveau. My dad, somewhat out of character, approached a scalper and bought a pair of tickets high above the action. The story made a good impression, and our discussion remained lively for the duration of the trip.

While there's been some doubt raised about Canada's complete embrace of this year's Canuck team, for me the Stanley Cup is truly complete when a Canadian team competes for it. That gave me some motivation to watch Game Five.

Not feeling well meant I was forced to listen to much of the televised game. What a pleasure! The game had splendid, swift movement which perfectly lent itself to a fluid, radio-style play-by-play. There were blessedly few play stoppages, thus avoiding the pitfalls of dull, slow-mo replays (this technology has killed televised baseball enjoyment, in my opinion). The event had the rhythm and excitement of a sport in constant movement, hockey's link to the broadcasts of thoroughbred horse racing and soccer. In the Canadian scholar Marshall McLuhan's scheme, radio's "hot" aspect compelled the listener to use imagination to complete the experience. That's what I did, although I did sit up to watch the game's final, dramatic five minutes. Those 300 seconds were plenty "hot," even with the "cool" TV picture. In short, Game Five was an excellent contest, a one-zero game in which players and spectators really cared about the outcome, and viewers such as I became involved -- the ideal scenario for a sports fan.

The Vancouver Canucks have never hoisted a Stanley Cup in the franchise's history. The Boston Bruins have not won a Cup in 39 years. Now I'm curious about who wins, although I admit my heart is with the Canucks. Besides, I'm too much of a New Yorker to root for Boston in anything.

Vancouver wins it in seven, eh?