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June 02 Stanley Cup Fever Hits OttawaBack from the land of the missing  Now I'm not a big sports fan, but I do enjoy catching the playoffs, especially when there's a home team involved.Stanley Cup fever has gripped the Nation's Capital (Ottawa, Ontario, Canada for those who don't know their capitals) and for good reason. For the first time since the current version of the Ottawa Senators rejoined the National Hockey League 15 years ago, the team has made it all the way to The Stanley Cup finals. It's actually not the first time the Senators have played for the cup. Way back in 1927 the old version of the team, which was also known as the Ottawa Hockey Club or Silver Seven, won it. 1927 just happened to be the first official year that the NHL held sole ownership of the trophy so that was a particularly special win. The team has actually won the cup 10 times since the beginnings of The Stanley Cup way back in 1892. Thanks to Wikipedia for providing me with the information. It's unbelievable the number of cars driving around with Senator flags flying (some with 2 flags, 1 white and 1 red), people wearing Senator jerseys or old senator costumes, faces painted up in the Senators colours and signs posted all over the city. The city of Ottawa declared Elgin St. in downtown Ottawa "The Red Mile" and the street has been and will be closed down during each playoff game so that partiers can have someplace to celebrate (be warned, the Ottawa police have a high presence on the street to ensure no drinking in the street or hooliganism or crime goes on - not that there's been any trouble up to this point, Ottawa fans have been pretty well behaved during their celebrating). The park across from city hall has the unofficial name of "Red Square". Caught a brief interview with a TSN sportscaster who is in town for game 3 tonight and he said that he has never seen anything like the atmosphere that is being shown here tonight, and he was even comparing it to some of the big sporting events that go on in the States saying that what he has seen here today far outdoes the events at those other events. The atmosphere is electric and highly charged (and I'm not referring to the thunderstorm watches and warnings that are in the area tonight). Even though the team lost the first 2 games of the final while on the road the fans have not lost faith in the team, and if anything it's brought out even more team spirit. I think after tonights game the Anaheim Ducks are going to be "shell shocked". It'll be interesting to see if the Sens can pull off bringing The Cup back to Canada for the first time since 1993. History shows that any year ending in 7 the cup has gone to a Canadian team. Go Sens Go! |
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