Jump to content
Jambands.ca

Official 2007 NHL Playoff Thread


badams

Recommended Posts

  • Replies 195
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Rebuttal to the piece of shit article yesterday

Let's get inside Sidney's head

Boo loud, boo often

David Reevely, The Ottawa Citizen

Published: Saturday, April 14, 2007

When you're sitting in the stands at Scotiabank Place, you've got three ways to show what you think of what's happening on the ice: you can cheer, you can boo, or you can sit quietly and observe the athletic contest taking place before you.

Too many Canadian hockey fans, and Ottawa fans in particular, choose the third option. You can always tell a Senators fan in any crowd: he's the one showing dignified restraint.

I suppose fans in the stands could cheer for the Senators and sit silently when their opponents are controlling the play. But calm isn't in the makeup of someone who'd take out a second mortgage for playoff tickets, nor should it be. You get into the game, you get worked up, and you want to shout something. In this civil-service town, a battle at the hockey arena is one of your rare opportunities.

So I was disappointed, not to say baffled, by my colleague Hugh Adami's column yesterday calling on Ottawa fans not to boo the Pittsburgh Penguins' Sidney Crosby whenever he touches the puck during the first-round hockey playoff series against the Senators. That's what the crowd did at Scotiabank Place in the first game on Wednesday, and I say good for them.

Yes, Crosby's a star centre, and soon will probably be a superstar who'll define a whole era for the game the way Wayne Gretzky did. If the 19-year-old National Hockey League scoring leader lives up to that promise, he'll deserve a standing ovation in every rink he visits as he makes his farewell tour years from now, including here in Ottawa. Even this spring, if the Penguins pull it together and win the series fairly in a game here in Ottawa, fans of the sport will clap for the young phenomenon and his team. I hate even to whisper about the possibility, but let's acknowledge it.

Just now, though, Sidney Crosby is the best player on the first team standing between the Senators and their first Stanley Cup in 80 years. The home crowd is supposed to be a seventh man on the ice for the home team. Since we can't deflect pucks and throw bodychecks, we yell.

If it's a true fan's obligation to cheer for Daniel Alfredsson and Jason Spezza, and it is, you better believe it's that same fan's job to boo the Pens' Crosby and Evgeni Malkin. There's a difference between booing and being nasty. We're not throwing batteries or bottles or octopi at them, we're waging psychological warfare.

The man makes $850,000 a year to play hockey, the maximum for a new player and a fraction of what he'll be paid in a couple of years. Part of what makes Crosby a star is that he's a pro, and he knew enough to publicly shrug off the booing after Game 1 of the series. Some of that money he makes is for recognizing the abuse for what it is and for not taking it personally. But he's also young and in his first NHL playoff series, playing for a team that relies heavily on offence to win. If Senators fans can get inside his head even a little by completely changing the tone in the arena whenever the puck slips from a Senator's possession to Crosby's, it could make the difference.

You think he doesn't know exactly what he's doing when he trash-talks opponents on the ice, tries to make opponents' checks look a little dirtier than they are, or has words with the opposing coach, the way Crosby did with Ottawa's Bryan Murray in a late-season game? He's trying to distract them from their game plan. There's more to hockey than what happens while the puck is in play.

For years, goaltender Ed Belfour, a great player, had opposing fans chanting "Ehhhhhhhh-deeeeeeeee" whenever a crack started to show in the wall he put up in front of the net, and sometimes it worked. Toronto fans boo Alfredsson whenever he touches the puck at the Air Canada Centre, and it'd only be more intense if the two teams met in the playoffs again.

Wouldn't it be great if Scotiabank Place got a reputation as a place other teams truly dreaded visiting? If the fans in the stands weren't just the seventh man on the ice, but the eighth and ninth and tenth, too? Ottawa crowds' vocal support for the Senators shouldn't just be known around the league, it should be legendary.

The second game is this afternoon. Boo hard, and boo often. Boo in the stands, boo at Local Heroes and MacLaren's and the pub on the corner. Boo outside the electronics store at the mall. Boo at home, loud enough for them to hear in Kanata. This is hockey country, and it's the Sens' town, and neither Sidney Crosby nor anybody else in a Penguins uniform should be allowed to forget it.

DAVID REEVELY is a member of the Citizen's editorial board.

E-mail: dreevely@thecitizen.canwest.com

Link to comment
Share on other sites

A couple of brutal moments of blown defensive coverage cost them what was otherwise a very well played game.

Comrie drops the gloves for the second game in a row?!?! Didn't look like he really knew how to throw them, but he certainly knew how to defend himself.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

You've gotta like the fans in Pittsburgh booing the Canadian anthem. Have you ever seen a more Canadian roster than this??

Marc-Andre Fleury Sorel, QC

Jocelyn Thibault Montreal, QC

Alain Nasreddine Montreal, QC

Colby Armstrong Lloydminster, SK

Erik Christensen Edmonton, AB

Sidney Crosby Cole Harbour, NS

Georges Laraque Montreal, QC

Michel Ouellet Rimouski, QC

Mark Recchi Kamloops, BC

Gary Roberts North York, ON

Jordan Staal Thunder Bay, ON

Maxime Talbot Lemoyne, QC

Chris Thorburn Sault Ste. Marie, ON

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now



×
×
  • Create New...