Saturday, January 17, 2009

Bruins Blog Project Game 7: 1/13/08 vs. Montreal Canadiens



Final Score: Bruins 3 Canadiens 1
Attended With: Dave
Banner Count: 2 Jumbotron appearances, 1 TV appearance (to be explained later)

Pregame: The MBTA must have read my last blog (here's your shoutout Dan Grabauskas) because Dave and I flew into North Station on gameday, getting to Hurricane O'Reilly's by about 5:20. And we weren't the only ones...

Canadiens/Bruins games are a treat because they're regular season games with playoff atmospheres (if you really want to blow your mind, go to a Bruins/Canadiens playoff game. Holy shit, they're intense.)

Dave and I were seated quickly, but the place was PACKED. Fans from Montreal always flock to Boston for these games because it's a relatively short drive and it's much easier to get tickets here than it is up there. Entire sections get filled with Habs fans (I'm looking at you Sec. 303.) We ate, had a few beers (O'Reilly's has an epic deal on Miller High Life FYI) and soaked in the festive atmosphere. A few "Go Habs Go" and "Ole" chants broke out, but nothing too severe.

We went early and scoped out the Pro Shop eager to show off our new project. The Banner.

Before every game, the Bruins play a great historical montage, then a season montage before introductions. They are incredibly well done and really give you the chills. Well, there's a portion that resonated with me, and I figured it would be a good way to celebrate our first year as Season Ticket Holders and honor Bruins fans of the past.

In one part of the video they show fans holding a banner that reads "Killer B's" and waving it in the balcony. At one point in the offseason I said, "I'm going to make that banner," and the time had finally come. A Habs/B's game would be the perfect time to unveil this to the masses and start a new tradition with our seats.



Jon got me the sheet (King sized, ugh) and during my days off, I went to work with some paint, a Sharpie and some brushes. Then, on game day, Scott helped me cut it down so the freaking King sized sheet wasn't visible from Outer Space. It was fun work and it was ready to go.

Dave and I got it into the Garden no problem (we were unsure the rules of banners so we hid it anyway) and laid out the banner so we could raise it quickly and, more importantly, not backwards. Then we sat there... and sat there. I mean, it was 20 minutes to game time, the building wasn't really full. Should we look like idiots and start showing this banner off to no one?

Sure!

We noticed this group doing a similar thing with a Bruins flag in Sec. 305 so we decided to join them. With 2 minutes left in the pregame skate we stood up, unfurled The Banner and pointed it to our right to our flag bearing friends, unsure what people would think.

Everyone fucking loved it!

The flag dudes were going nuts, people in our section were asking us to turn around so they could see it and snap pics. Our confidence boosted and we were no longerembarassed to flash the banner.



During the pregame montage when the banner showed (14 second mark) people in our section were like, "Put up the banner!" which we did a few seconds late. We're going to try and make this Standard Operating Banner Procedure. Flash the banner, during the montage



The Game: God I love Habs/B's tilts. It's perfectly acceptable, if not expected, to lose your voice by the end of the 1st period. As much as I hate Canadiens fans, you have to respect them, because they bring Bruins fans to the next level. The Garden was rocking from puck drop.

Zdeno Chara was an absolute beast. In the opening seconds, he flattened Tom Kostopolous, went on to score 2 goals in the game and just shut down everyone near him.

The first period was scoreless, the Habs were flying, we got popped up on the Jumbotron once and everyone inside was on edge.

The Habs scored first on a goal by one of the flying Kostitsyn Sisters and Habs fans were eager to shove it in our face. Big Z answered back (Jumbotron sighting!) and then scored again on a slapper that acted more like a changeup because of an Andrei Markov deflection.

In the midst of these two goals this happened:



The roof was barely on the Garden by the 2nd intermission.

I don't know when this happened, but it's worth mentioning. There was a huge brawl in Sec. 314 and it looked like Bruin on Bruin violence. Someone got jersey'd, and there were some huge haymakers thrown as well. Sad, really.

Montreal kept threatening in the 3rd, leaving us on the edge of our seat. It wasn't until near the last minute of the game when the Czech Jesus, David Krejci iced it.

Then my phone started ringing off the hook. Hmmm.... I wonder why? "Were we on TV? It's a VS game, I doubt they'd show us. Let me call Jon back."

Holy shit, we were! It's pretty much all Dave (rocking his autographed Manny Fernandez t-shirt) and the top of my hat. But it's still very amazing to me:



Post-game: I triumphantly wore the Killer B's banner as a cape on the way out. People still loved it. Dave and I hit Sully's Tap afterwards, which was about 103 degrees and still (shockingly) smelled of shit. After that, a slice of pizza at Halftime Pizza and a ride home on the T, only to watch us on the DVR about one million times after.

Thanks to peeps at HFBoards for the pics, and encouraging words about the banner during its contruction.

The Banner will now be rotated between the Season Ticket Holders and will hopefully be at every game for the rest of the year. Stop by and say hi.

Next two homegames are all me, St Louis with my Mom, and then Washington.

1 comment:

Zach said...

I ate at halftime pizza. Not bad for New England cuisine.

I love Thomas acting as an enforcer, but someone else should've leveled him instead. Not that Aaron Ward is worth standing up for, but still.

Who had those Ranger tickets to the 1-0 game?