Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: SUNDAY, March 27, 1994 TAG: 9403300133
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: D3 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Elizabeth Strother
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
I discovered the thrill of live hockey back in the late '60s, when the NHL expanded to St. Louis and the Blues took the ice and caught fire with the fans. Nobody in town knew much of anything about hockey, but we didn't have to know all the rules to appreciate the breathtaking speed and precision of this sport. Faster than basketball, tougher than football, it took the sheer beauty of flawlessly executed plays and put the action on ice, increasing the pace to the second power.
The Blues weren't very good, actually, being an expansion club - "building," as they said. But the team became a sensation. I remember that at the games at the Arena, there was blue water in the toilet bowls. Suddenly, in a show of loyalty, all of the young couples who hired me as a baby sitter had blue water in their toilets at home. Flushing became a thrill.
It was wild. People were hockey mad, and this was understandable. Watching even a mediocre team play at the major-league level is just a lot of fun.
And this was my problem. I was delighted when all the pieces fell into place to bring a team to the Roanoke Civic Center. A professional sports team can nurture a sense of identity and pride in a community, make it a more lively place, enrich people's lives, create memories for its children. I loved the idea.
But gosh, the only hockey I had ever seen was played by the fabulously fair-to-middling Blues. I wasn't sure I'd enjoy anything less. This was the demanding part.
The ignorant part was - well, there are lots of ignorant parts, frankly.
First, having decided I didn't want to miss the entire first Express season, I went to the final game of the regular season. After the team had secured a niche in the playoffs. The night before the first game in the playoff series. As sportswriter Randy King wrote in the next morning's paper: "Roanoke ... slept through the first two periods of the meaningless game."
Now, no sports contest is all that meaningful to me, to be honest, but I was rather chagrined to realize I had picked for my first Express game one that was meaningless even to the players.
Which, I now understand, was why for two periods I was thinking that I hadn't been nearly snobbish enough in my assumptions about the level of skill in the minor leagues. For a while, it looked as if the most exciting moment on the ice was going to be when Roanoke City Councilman Mac McCadden had to thread the needle and drive the massive Zamboni off the rink without tearing down a wall.
But I didn't care. I was having fun. I loved the feel of being there. The crowd was cheerful and upbeat; the mascot was suitably ugly; the between-period entertainment corny and charming (from cute little youth-league boys skating around the rink handing off their trophy from player to player to the grown-up boys facing off in a mock game between owners and media: Suits vs. Hoots, I mentally tagged them, though darned if those Hoots didn't win). And the Express train horn that blasted when the real players took the ice was terrific.
They were having a lousy night, but I wasn't. That Huntington team was just real good, my friends and I told each other repeatedly. Especially their goalie (who, it turns out, was former Express goalie Jim Mill). Next morning, I read in Randy's story: "Unwilling to suffer the indignity of losing to Huntington, the Express awoke in the final 20 minutes and overpowered the ECHL's weakest club."
OK, so I didn't know that they were lousy and we were just playing lousier. And a real fan, given a choice between the season-ender and the opening game of the playoffs, would pick the playoff game. But my ignorance paid off.
Just as Randy said, the Express came out in the final period and whomped 'em. They started the period down 5-2, and won the game 8-6. The crowd was in a frenzy. Incredibly, after Roanoke had come from three down to tie the score 6-6 with almost 13 minutes left to play, one of the guys in my group got up and left, saying he wanted to beat the traffic. Is this man nuts?
Of course, I'm no fanatic either, and no mere game is going to make me anything less than civil, so I gave him a friendly pat on the back as he slipped by and yelled, "I hope we win and you don't see it!"
And we did. The snobs may sneer it was not great hockey, but it was a heckuva comeback.
Unfortunately, the team lost the playoff game the following night, 5-2, and was eliminated from the playoffs in Game 2. If the players had their druthers, I'm sure they'd rather have won the important games by a squeak than the meaningless one with six goals in the final period. But I, in my ignorance, had definitely picked the right night to be in the stands.
And I understand why attendance all season has been good - stronger than the optimists could have dared hope. The Express belong to Roanoke. I'm waiting now for that defining marketing moment to rival the blue water in the toilet bowl.
Perhaps a tank that blasts the sound of a train horn when you pull the lever ... I can hear it now, sounding from homes across the valley.
by CNB