My time with Stanley.

I don't think I'm much of a storyteller, nor is there much of a story here (maybe there is), but I thought for my first fanpost, I'd share my experience with the finest silver chalice in all the land. Beware of rambling!

Earlier this week, I got a call from my brother asking me if I wanted to go to the Rockford Icehogs game on Sunday with him, his wife, their kids, and our dad (who says he remembers one of the lines for his first hockey game at the old Stadium was Mosienko-Bentley-Bentley, about 70 damn years ago). Of course, being interested in watching future Hawks, of course I said yes. Then he said they would have all the trophies there from last season; Duncan Keith's Norris, Jonathan Toews' Conn Smythe, the Western Conference trophy and the big daddy, the Stanley Cup.  Well, this got me extra excited. Not only that, through his wife's work, he was able to get box seats. Bonus.

 

So, earlier today, we get there maybe 5 mins after the doors opened at 3. The game was to start at 4. I figured we'd have enough time to see the Cup and watch most of the game. Boy, was I wrong. We got in there and the line was literally almost all the way around the MetroCentre. The doors had not even been open ten minutes by the time we got our spot in line.

To give you an idea what we were dealing with, this was what the line looked behind me and in front of me about an hour into our wait. Just around the corner in front was where the cup was, along with a snaking line that lead to it. Taken with my shitty phone camera.

 

I

Behind us.

In front of us.

At one point, during the two hours we were waiting in line, the guy behind us scouted ahead and found out they were pretty much letting you do anything you wanted to the cup, short of picking it up...including putting your baby in the cup. My brother already said he wanted to do that with his one year old son, but didn't think he would be able to, now he got excited that he could. So we wait..and wait..and wait. At one point, the line completely stops during the beginning of the game (which was not too long before I took those pictures above) so Stanbow can take the Cup out on the ice in an old muscle car. I didn't get to see a whole lot of this, as I was waiting in line, but I saw a little on the scoreboard screen. My brother went in and got some pictures (someone had to keep our place in line. grumblegrumble) but I haven't seen them yet.

Fast forward another hour wait in line and we're almost there. We can actually see it from now, so we start taking pictures. They're kinda shitty due to the fact that you don't want to be that douchehole holding up the line to see the most glorious trophy in sports. And also because they were kind of hurrying people along so it was difficult to get a picture without someone in it. You've seen it hundreds of times before but here's what I took:

 

Yes. That is a fucking Malkin jersey.

 

Saw a few Scum jerseys, as well. While in line, one of them went up to one of the food vendors and the vendor said "we don't serve your kind here." Thought that was about right.

 

Stupid Hammy getting in the way.

Blurry shot of the Norris, the Conn Smythe and the Western Conference trophy (or the Stanley Cup if you refer to CNS' hilarious SI cover). It was hard to get this one at a visible angle without people being in the way.

 

We've all seen it in pictures and whatnot, but it's just got so much more of an aura around it when you see it in person. It's beautiful.

 

So we snaked through the final section of the queue and it was finally my turn. I was trying to think what I was going to do when I got there..but I decided to just wing it. You had the option of giving the people running the whole shebang your camera to take a picture or they could take one and you can get it online. i chose for them to use my camera. I got up there..and decided to go for it.

 

Better than kissing my ex.

My favorite comment that I could hear was "He's kissing it!" Fuck yeah, I was. For a good five seconds, too. The flash went off and I figured that should probably be enough. I grabbed my camera and waited for my brother to have his picture taken. Unfortunately, his son was "too big" (despite probably weighing less than either of my cats..then again, those cats are fatasases) to be put in the cup but they still got a good picture.  I was a little sad my dad didn't get a picture with it, seeing how he's been a fan so long and is the reason my brother and I are, but he's and older man and didn't want to wait in line, so we understood. I also regret not touching the other trophies. But they were hurrying people in and out so I didn't even have time to think about it until it had passed.

 

Now, you would think the story would end there, but it didn't.  By the time we got out of there and to the suite, the second period was almost over and it looked like I was missing a pretty good game as it was 3-3 at that point, but it was worth missing it, and they were showing the game on monitors throughout the arena while we were in line. The only goal we really got a good look at was the first Icehogs goal by Simon Danis-Pepin, which was a real pretty tap in on a 2 on 1 breakaway with a nice pass from Ryan Potulny. But anyways, the second period ended and there was a little more excitement. Everyone I was with got up and were walking around, but my dad came back telling me there's someone with a ring outside and they're passing it around and taking pictures with it. I had to get in on this. I went out there and there was a small crowd of maybe 7-8 people around Mark Bernard, the GM of minor league affiliations and his ring. His huge, bright, shiny, beautiful ring. My brother and I got to talking to him and he said he was driving the other day, while wearing the ring, and the sun hit it just right as he was sitting at a red light and he couldn't stop staring at it. I don't know about you, but I would never stop staring at it. He was super nice and let whoever put it on and take a picture with it. Of course, you know what's comin next.

Bling bling. Or: fear the beard.

 

As you can see, the thing is ginormous. Bernard told my brother's 10 year old stepdaughter not to accept anything less than this when you marry that doctor or lawyer in the future. Like I said, super nice guy. We saw McDonough floating around up there, too, but didn't talk to him. We were only two or three suites down from theirs and I wouldn't doubt if Stanbow was around there somewhere. So, after that excitement died down (and, my brother + his kids got a a picture with it as well), we went back to our suite to enjoy the rest of the game. It was a pretty exciting game with the Sammy Davis JuniorJunior Hawks winning 5-4.  At one point, I had asked my dad about how Kyle Beach had been doing. Not a minute later, he gets into a bit of a scrum in front of the Griffins' net, losing his helmet and throwing a few punches into the pile up. I was only able to get a picture of the aftermath.

I'm sure whoever he punched deserved it.

I had just got done telling my dad that Beach is kind of crazy, too. Somehow, he didn't get hauled off and feel shame in the penalty box.There was a point where I asked how Jeremy Morin had been doing as well, and again, not a minute later, he weaved his way around 4 Grand Rapids players before dekeing and coming just short of scoring a beaut of a goal. But it was enough to leave an impression. I like where this kid is going, and he's only going to get better.

There's not much more to the story as I only got a full period of watching in, so I can't really do any sort of scouting report, but you could tell who will probably be up with the big boys at some point, and Igor Marakov had a nice goal, but that's about it. So I'll just finish this up with the few pictures I was able to take.

 

3rd period face-off.

 

Minihawks on defense. We were closer than this looks.

 

Self congratulation.

 

#1 Star of the game, Rob Klinkhammer.

 

Final.

So that's my story of me and Stanley McGee. It was a really good experience and worth the 2 hours wait. I kissed the Stanley Cup and got to wear a championship ring. That's more than a lot of NHL players can say. Eat a dick, Ovi.