Red Hot Hockey: The Fan Experience

[RichH]

[quote evilnaturedrobot] At no point on Saturday night did I feel that anyone else around me was living and dying with the team.  There's a fundamental camaraderie to the Lynah experience, and that's lost when those standing around you don't seem to care.

And call this silly, but I've always felt that we, as a fan base, have a reputation to live up too.  It bothers me when we fall short.[/quote]

I get that, really I do, because I was there once.  At some point I just stopped caring what other people thought of me or my fanbase.  I go to hockey games to have fun, not to perform...I'm not going to be someone's dancing monkey.  We're not paid at games to put on a show.  I'll call a fellow Cornell fan an asshole if they're being an asshole, and I'll laugh when others do something funny.  And I'll scream my head off at the on-ice action because I get very involved in the game.  Chants and cheers are part of the fun in-between play.  If others want to blog that what we collectively do is great or lame or overhyped, so be it.  I just don't care.

No doubt, I think my enjoyment of the MSG game was because I happened to be surrounded by a lot of other fun fans...we stood, we cheered (and groaned) together.  Nothing we did really could be heard halfway across the arena.  If people want the full "Lynah Faithful" experience, they're going to have to go to Lynah.  The road fans this year haven't been as large-in-number or as loud as usual, but I'm not going to change how I enjoy a game based on any kind of reputation.

There's a reason there were so many +15 (and up) ticket groups in the MSG roll-call...and it's the camaraderie that you speak of.  It's too bad you weren't near one of those.

[evilnaturedrobot]

[quote Beeeej][quote evilnaturedrobot][quote billhoward]
Others criticized the facetimers. You can't have all 12,000 Cornellians be experts on hockey arcana such as the teams changing sides each period. (I was at Sunday's NY Rangers game and a companion wasn't clear why Jagr, in the penalty box, didn't release when Dallas scored. Answer: Dallas was in the box, too.)
[/quote]

Oh I understand, the reason this game drew 18,200 as opposed to 9,000 is because it was the Facetiming event of the semester.  Without that we're looking at a half empty arena.  Even so, much of what I love about the usual  Cornell hockey experience was missing here. At no point on Saturday night did I feel that anyone else around me was living and dying with the team.  There's a fundamental camaraderie to the Lynah experience, and that's lost when those standing around you don't seem to care.

And call this silly, but I've always felt that we, as a fan base, have a reputation to live up too.  It bothers me when we fall short.  I was a hockey fan before I came to Cornell, I don't need the kind of fan involvement seen at Lynah (and on the road) to maintain interest in the game, but there are so many things that make the Lynah experience unique and wonderful.  I felt that most of those where missing on Saturday night.  That is all.[/quote]

I think you're going to need to get over it, dude.  The game was targeted at local alumni, and while the Faithful were going to fill a certain number of the seats, nobody with any sense was expecting Section A times a hundred.  If the people immediately around you weren't living and dying with the team, you picked the wrong people to go with you.[/quote]

Oh, I mostly am.  And I expected the game to be facetimer central, I guess I just didn't expect it to bother me to the extent it did.  None the less, this thread is about the fan experience, and this was mine.

As much fun as this was, I'm looking forward to the subsequent games at Agganis and Lynah a good deal more than this one.

[heykb]

Count me among those who were delighted with the event.

Sure, my Philly-based 16 year old knew more of the cheers than most of the people in the section, and only a couple of people knew to ask us for some of our newspaper for the BU introductions, but it was a blast. The plusses outweighed the minuses.

+ I got to take my wife and (the one CU hockey-loving) son to a game

+ There were a ton of CU fans in the place

+ Did anyone else note the 5-1 score going into the 3rd period? I said to the guy on my right "I've only seen us come back from a 5-1 deficit once, and it was a miracle." The guy in front of me overheard and turned around, smiling. I said "ECAC Quarters against Providence, 1979" and he nodded. My son, Nolan, even asked me if anyone else celebrated March 6 as Randy Wilson Day.

+ Smithwick's and Newcastle on tap

+ The Screw BU cheer done by 10,000+ fans. Warms the cockles of my heart.

+ MSG personnel weren't surly. They actually seemed downright helpful. It was a fine venue for the event.

+ A great excuse to spend the day in Manhattan. It was nice not to be in a hurry - the 8:00 start worked out great.

The major minus to the whole thing: Cornell failing to play something resembling good hockey for huge hunks of time.

I agree Rich that this would be a great event every few years. Personally, I could see them doing it every three years - continuing the home-and-home-and-neutral-ice agreement they just signed. In fact, I bet they could move the BU home game from Agannis to the Gahden and pack that place, too. It'd sure make it easier for us out-of-towners to get tix there.

All in all, a great experience.

Karl '77

[CowbellGuy]

[quote krose]But there were a few things that really stood out as in need of serious updating: no seamless glass, tiny bathrooms with *huge* lines between periods, uncomfortable seats.[/quote]

Well, it's still a 40-year-old building. Some of the facilities aren't great, but it holds up pretty well for its age. Besides, what were you doing in your seat?

As for the glass, no thanks. Hopefully everyone learned their lessons from the injuries caused by the stiffer seamless glass boards.

[oceanst41]

[quote amerks127]

this being one week after my own mature self verbally bitch-slapped a smarmy, obnoxious little 14-year-old at Dartmouth

You got off easy then.  A 12-year-old openly challenged me to fight at the end of that game...might've been for my "Hanover's in Dartmouth" cheer.[/quote]

Reminds me of '06 at Cheel when some Cub Scouts let me know how awful Cornell was playing.

[oceanst41]

There is something to be said as well that the vast majority of the fans had a blast despite the score. Win or lose I love that we can still come away with great experiences from games such at this.

[Killer]

[quote Beeeej]Plenty of good photos of the game are available, by the way, on CHN:

http://www.collegehockeynews.com/news/2007/11/25_butops.php[/quote]

Here's one for you: In picture #15, which shows the "sea of red" crowd shot, I was actually able to identify myself, all the way across the arena from the photogragher.

[billhoward]

"Not bad for a 40-year-old building" is still a 40-year-old building.

Despite Cornell's less-than-perfect experiences playing hockey in the state of Minnesota, the Xcel Energy Center in St. Paul would be a good example of a modern facility that appeals to hockey fans. Ditto the half-billion-dollar Prudential Center in Newark that just opened.

Places such as Comerica Park and Citizens Bank Park (Philadelphia Phillies) are other examples of up-to-date facilities that make the experience more positive for a wide range of fans. Sight lines are important but so are wide concourses, and decently maintained bathrooms your wife or girlfriend won't gripe about for the next period, even big video screens so you can better see the replays.

The best thing you can say about MSG is that the ruins of the old Pennsylvania Station that MSG rests upon was the catalyst for the historic preservation movement which is mostly a good thing. Having gone overboard in one direction (allowing a beautiful structure to pass from existence) we now have pitched battles fought at the local level anytime someone wants to replace a barely historic building with something possibly more useful. I'm surprised someone didn't try to save University Halls for that reason.

[Rosey]

[quote CowbellGuy][quote krose]But there were a few things that really stood out as in need of serious updating: no seamless glass, tiny bathrooms with *huge* lines between periods, uncomfortable seats.[/quote]

Well, it's still a 40-year-old building. Some of the facilities aren't great, but it holds up pretty well for its age. Besides, what were you doing in your seat? [/quote]

Well, I notice you misquoted me by replacing the context of my sitting with a period.  I was in row 2, smart guy, with lots of people sitting behind me who would have been unhappy looking through me.

[quote CowbellGuy]I'm a poopyhead.[/quote]

You don't say? ;-)

Kyle

[ugarte]

[quote billhoward]"Not bad for a 40-year-old building" is still a 40-year-old building. ... Ditto the half-billion-dollar Prudential Center in Newark that just opened. [/quote]
You say "40 year old building," I say "half-billion dollar Prudential Center." MSG is more than adequate and Dolan is going to need that money to buy out Isiah and pay the lawyers for his losing appeal.

It is a sports facility. If you want to be pampered, get a 60" HDTV and a recliner with cupholder.

[Greenberg '97]

For the life of me, I was trying to figure out why it looks like we're defending our side of the ice in the second period.  Then I figured it out... it's 19.4 seconds left in the 2nd INTERMISSION, the refs are getting set at center ice, and Scrivens is scraping the crease.  Not sure what's going on at our penalty box, though...

[Beeeej]

[quote ugarte] you want to be pampered, get a 60" HDTV and a recliner with cupholder.[/quote]

Wait, that's a cupholder?!  Dammit, no wonder it ruined my DVD.

[billhoward]

You're saying that Isiah's "a white man calling a black woman 'bitch,' that is wrong with me" defense may not fly?

[Killer]

[quote Greenberg '97]For the life of me, I was trying to figure out why it looks like we're defending our side of the ice in the second period.  Then I figured it out... it's 19.4 seconds left in the 2nd INTERMISSION, the refs are getting set at center ice, and Scrivens is scraping the crease.  Not sure what's going on at our penalty box, though...[/quote]

Yeah, it took me a bit to figure it out as well.  Everything looked right, except for the teams being at the wrong ends, thus my "Hey, that's me!" moment was rapidly deteriorating.  Then it dawned on me what was going on and it all made sense again.  Although, I can't shed any light on the activity at the penalty box.  We had a carryover from the 1st to the 2nd periods, but nothing after Nash released following BU's 4th goal late in the 2nd.  Maybe just a social call?

[ugarte]

You can tell how much someone really cares about the hockey by how much they notice the facetimers. As far as I'm concerned, an obsession with the so-called undesirables and one's Faithful cred is a different form of facetiming. Just watch the goddamn game and stop worrying about who else is there with you. If you want more noise, make more noise.

I thought everything about the event was A+ except a three minute nightmare in the middle of the first period and a bunch of sore losers yelling "Boston Sucks" and "Red Sox Suck" as we left MSG. I didn't have any rude winners in my wave of the exiting throng.