You need a good reason to brave near-freezing New Year’s Day temperatures, perhaps nursing a hangover, and trek all the way out to a baseball stadium.
Like ice hockey, played outdoors.
Nearly 43,000 fans did just that on Thursday to watch the hometown Washington Capitals beat the Chicago Blackhawks 3-2 at Nationals Park, home to Major League Baseball’s Washington Nationals.
That is well over double the maximum capacity of 18,500 at the Capital’s usual home ice, the downtown Verizon Center, and symbolic of the popularity of open-air professional hockey.
“We play hockey in baseball stadiums because we can,” said Matthew Tucker, 23, sporting a red Capitals jersey as he hung out with friends — Blackhawk fans, actually — before the match.
“If you get back to the roots of the game, you played outside,” added Tucker, who grew up playing hockey on frozen ponds in upstate New York.
Most NHL games unfold in comfortable heated indoor arenas, with the gladiatorial action playing itself out on pristine artificial ice.
However, the Winter Classic, played every New Year’s Day since 2008, has become the NHL’s marquee event.
That is special, given that the finals for NHL’s Stanley Cup championship typically go into mid-June — two months into the Major League Baseball season.
The weather at Thursday’s game was chilly, with bright blue skies and 6oC at the opening face-off, but not a deterrent for fans.
For many Americans in northern climes, near-freezing temperatures are par for the course for football in the run-up to the Super Bowl, which falls on Feb. 1 this year.
The Winter Classic is “an event that real fans go to,” said Blackhawks fan James Felke, 30, who made the trip down from Chicago for his third outdoor NHL experience.
“To brave the elements,” added his companion Molly Dudas, 26, as they discreetly polished off a tiny pre-game flask of cheap whiskey.
Capital fans vastly outnumbered their Blackhawks rivals, although they were united in the color of their respective teams’ jerseys, turning Nationals Park into a sea of crimson in the afternoon sun.
For anyone used to indoor hockey, where seating begins at rink side and the acoustics amplify the roar of the crowd, Thursday’s Winter Classic was a bit of a culture-clash experience.
Center ice was located around where second base would be on a baseball diamond, leaving a wide chasm between fans and players — a vacuum filled to a meager extent by the stadium audio system relaying the sounds of skates, sticks and pucks.
A US flag as big as the rink itself was unfurled for the playing of the US national anthem, as fireworks shot up high into the sky and two US fighter jets performed a screaming fly-by.
Live entertainment veered wildly from 1980s punk-pop star Billy Idol doing Rebel Yell before the game, to a US military choir belting out The Army Goes Rolling Along at the second intermission.
The players, in vintage uniforms, took to the ice via a scale-model replica of the US Capitol and a miniature, frozen Reflecting Pool.
Concession stands offered pretzels and cotton candy. The stadium’s branch of Washington’s iconic Ben’s Chili Bowl diner quickly sold out its signature dish.
The rink itself was the product of 75,700 liters of water, kept frozen by one of the world’s largest mobile refrigeration systems.
Tickets for Thursday’s game sold out long ago at between US$79 and US$349 a pop — and remained almost impossible to score at the last minute from illegal ticket sellers outside the main gate.
BOUNCE BACK: Curry scored 46 points in the Warriors’ victory over the Spurs, after ‘everybody stepped up’ following Tuesday’s blowout loss to Oklahoma City Nikola Jokic scoring 50 or more points had never been enough for the Denver Nuggets to win — until now. Jokic on Wednesday night tied the highest-scoring performance in the NBA this season with 55 points, as the Nuggets beat the Los Angeles Clippers 130-116 for their sixth straight victory. The Nuggets were 0-4 in his previous 50-point outbursts. “It’s a good feeling,” the three-time NBA Most Valuable Player said. He equaled Oklahoma City Thunder star Shai Gilgeous-Alexander, who had 55 in a double-overtime game at the Indiana Pacers on Oct. 23. Jokic has been on a roll during Denver’s winning streak. He is the
The tri-nation Twenty20 international series featuring hosts Pakistan, as well as Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe, is to be played entirely in Rawalpindi from Tuesday next week, the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) said yesterday, after this week’s suicide bombing in the capital, Islamabad. The change came after at least eight Sri Lankan players asked to leave over security fears following Tuesday’s bombing that killed 12 people and wounded 27. Their country’s cricket board issued a stern directive to the team to stay put or face consequences. Sri Lanka Cricket (SLC) said the decision to stay was taken after “close consultations” with hosts Pakistan who
France’s Kevin Aymoz snatched the men’s title at Skate America on Saturday, winning his first grand prix title with a battling free skate, while short program leader Kazuki Tomono faltered. It was an emotional triumph for Aymoz, who made his grand prix level debut in 2017, with seven prior podium finishes, but no gold. He had struggled with a painful foot injury since a disappointing 10th-place finish at Skate Canada last month. “It was so difficult,” the 28-year-old said. “After Skate Canada I wanted to give up so much and today I’m here and it’s so beautiful to be with my friends competing
Australian restaurant chain Grill’d has made a cheeky apology for putting a “curse” on Oscar Piastri’s Formula One title hopes with their offer of a free burger for every time the McLaren driver gets on the podium. The Melbourne native has not finished in the top three since the promotion relaunched five races ago, losing the championship lead to teammate Lando Norris and now 24 points behind. Online conspiracy theorists have been quick to put two and two together. The chain’s Piastri 81 Burger debuted ahead of the Australian Grand Prix in March, with his endorsement, and was relaunched in September after he
RSS