The Ice Sheet: Melting Down the Classic

Every day from Monday to Saturday, The Ice Sheet will take a look at the biggest stories in the league that happened on the ice and elsewhere the night before.

(An virtual recreation of an actual conversation that occurred on the morning of Jan. 1, 2008, in a cluttered post-party living room somewhere in Maryland.)

• "What are you putting on now? Not that 'Twilight Zone' marathon again."
• "Nope. A little thing called 'The Winter Classic.' Pittsburgh and Buffalo are playing a hockey game in a football stadium today. It's going to be awesome."
• "Give me the remote, I'll find something to ... wait, WTF? There's, like, 100,000 people there, it's snowing like hell and Bob Costas is standing in front of a hockey rink."
• "I told you it'd be cool. I mean, not as cool as watching Dick Clark's Rockin' New Year's Eve..."
• "Actually, Greg, the word is cruel. You've been doing the same Tom Carvel impression every year since Dick Clark came back from the stroke. Hey, who's this Crosby guy they keep showing?"

And with that, a grand experiment began: Using an outdoor game to attempt to sell hockey to a gaggle of 20-something females with a self-confessed puck allergy.

(Coming Up Next: Big Time Hollywood Stars at the Winter Classic, Scandalous and Hilarious Puck Headlines, Tonight's Must-See Games, a Great Little Bud Light Tribute to Hockey and Some Guy Who's Convinced the Winter Classic was Fixed.)

We only watched the majority of the first period together, but this much was clear: The New Year's Day Winter Classic provided an entry point for even the most casual fan that a hockey game in an arena does not. Yes, the NHL was blessed with picturesque conditions that won't necessarily be repeated in future editions of the event (should they occur). But it also gave the newbies I was watching the game with the chance to break the sport down in a nearly anthropological way: How do they make the ice? Why is the goalie wearing the ski cap? Is playing outdoors any harder than playing indoors, and what is it about this sport that makes that so?

These were the questions being tossed around at the start of the game; gradually, however, the conversation centered on one thing: Sidney Crosby. Perhaps it was NBC's nearly singular focus on the Penguins star, but it was clear the newbies were fascinated by him. "He's a captain and he's, like, 20 years-old? Do his teammates even listen to him?" "What makes him so much better than the other players?" "How did they get HD quality footage of him as a little boy walking through spooky corn stalks to play pond hockey?" (OK, they didn't actually ask that last question.)

For a casual hockey fan watching Crosby for the first time, he didn't disappoint. There was that Tiger Woods-like puck juggling act into the Sabres zone. There was that spin-o-rama move that resulted in a tough save for Ryan Miller. (Who absolutely ruled on that AMP Energy commercial, by the way.) There was a little bit of that Crosby feistiness in a scrum near the net, and then there was of course his anti-climatic game-winner in the shootout. "Why wouldn't it be, right?" Mike Emrick exclaimed after telling fans the game would be headed to the skills competition. I think Doc is a fairly brilliant and sly individual, so I can only assume he was pointing out the hilarity in the Winter Classic, the NHL's version of a unicorn at the circus, being decided by the shootout, the NHL's version of a real! live! mermaid! at the carnival.

The debate will now begin as to when, where and if the NHL should make an outdoor (or dome stadium) game an annual event. My FanHouse buddy Eric McErlain would be comfortable seeing it every three or four years. While it's difficult to separate the novelty from the real success of the event, I can't see how the NHL doesn't mount this again next season based on the unbelievable buzz the game created on what's been college football's day for decades.

But it has to remain on New Year's Day. John Collins, the league's senior executive vice president, spoke out of both sides of his mouth to The New York Times yesterday, saying the NHL wanted to stake a claim to Jan. 1 but that the date wasn't "etched in stone." Bollocks -- it is now, thanks to the tremendous job done by NBC, the Pittsburgh Penguins, the Buffalo Sabres and 71,217 frozen fans. The only time the Winter Classic isn't on Jan. 1 is if, by some quirk, the NFL is. And the only way there shouldn't be a Winter Classic every season is if the novelty doesn't transfer to other American locations; and even then, there's always Edmonton.

I have more Winter Classic thoughts and coverage over on Deadspin, where I'll be penning the NHL Closer for the next few weeks.

Puck Headlines

• A humorous first-person account of the Winter Classic, including a heretofore under-reported marriage proposal in the crowd.
• The Goose believes that the Winter Classic should remain in either Buffalo or Pittsburgh every year, if anywhere at all.
• Alan Pergament of The Buffalo News and I think alike: As good as NBC's coverage was, it's an absolute disgrace that there wasn't a single interview with any of the 71,217 fans who decided to use a national holiday to freeze their asses off watching a regular-season hockey game in a football stadium.
• What it felt like in the back row of the upper deck at the Winter Classic.
• Patrick Stack praises the NHL for finally playing to its base.
• STOP THE PRESSES! A Canadian newspaper believes the CBC did a better job than NBC on the Classic.
• Finally, for future Winter Classics, Scott Burnside of ESPN makes "a case for why they shouldn't be played, or at least for why they shouldn't count in the standings." Thanks Debbie Downer. Wah-waaaaah...

Celebrity Puckhead Watch



William Fichtner is a Buffalo boy who apparently loves his puck, as he's blogging for the NHL. And if you don't know who William Fichtner is, then you probably haven't watched a movie in the last 13 years.



Buffalo native Chad Michael Murray watches the Winter Classic. Not having watched "One Tree Hill" and having watched "House of Wax" only to see Paris Hilton bite it, I'm not too familiar with the young man. But judging from the aesthetics, he seems to be doing quite well. (Unless she's his sister, in which case I feel dirty.) Points for the Derek Roy jersey. Major points.

Obvious and Shameful Self-Pimping

Please to be celebrating the end of 2007 with my annual NHL awards on The Fourth Period: "Happy Pucking New Year." Sample prose:

BEST HALL OF FAME PERFORMANCE: Mark Messier's tear ducts. Seriously, watching him work the room during induction weekend must have been like watching Michael Stipe after cutting the world's largest onion.

This Week's Glimpse Into the Maddeningly Awesome World of the HF Boards

I'm sure RedWingsGuy80 isn't the first cat to believe the Winter Classic's tidy ending may have been scripted, but he might be the first to accuse Major League Baseball of fixing Barry Bonds's 73rd home run:

First of all, I am not intending to be offensive or imply that another other historic games or moments in hockey have been "fixed" or "staged", but with things in sports nowdays, like Barry Bonds' 73-home run season and his breaking of Hank Aaron's all-time Home Run record both basically being "fixed"/"staged" AND with today's game being an educational experience in which NBC and the NHL were likely trying to win back fans who gave up on hockey after the lockout, and with the shootout coming down between two of the most popular players in the game right now in Sidney Crosby and Ryan Miller, it seems as if that ending was almost a little too predictable.

Ryan Miller is the second most popular player in hockey? Somewhere, Ovechkin weeps. Congrats RedWingsGuy80 ... YOUR AITCH EFFY IS IN THE MAIL!

Tonight's Games You Should Be Watching

• Dallas visits Detroit, and despite being 11 points behind the Red Wings, they ain't scared.
• Atlanta visits Carolina for a pretty big Southeast Division battle.
• The Rangers head to Western Canada to battle the Flames, where Calgary faces some burning issues heading into the second half of its season. (Burning...flames...yep.)

Gratuitous YouTube Embed

I don't recall seeing this Bud Light hockey commercial before, but it's pretty damn clever and universal -- this could have easily been about stick ball, too: