I went to my first ice-hockey match at the weekend. That's not strictly true of course, I have watched a high school match and I have sat through Finn's team 'playing' oh, so many times, but until Saturday I had never experienced a head to head between two professional teams. The Syracuse Crunch were the home side and last week they were facing their nearest big city rivals from Rochester. Two local cities meant lots of fans from both sides and the arena was full.
Ice-hockey is fast. So fast in fact that if you keep your eyes on the player with the puck, as soon as he passes it, the play is lost to you, or to me anyway. I found out very quickly that the best thing to do is keep a broad view of the whole rink, that way you can follow the play as it happens and not spend the whole game two shots behind the puck. Luckily for me we had seats way, way up so it was easy to watch all the ice at once.
There were a few things I had expected to see, I've watched enough American TV to have picked up a few hints, but a couple of things caught me by surprise. Kissing Cam was one. I don't know if this happens anywhere else but it would appear that during this particular phase, if you notice that the big screens are showing you, you must turn to your significant other and....well....kiss. Everyone knows about the music they play at hockey matches whenever anything significant happens, or just, like, all the time, but did you know that groups of the crowd get up and dance like lunatics at this point? Well, they do. Or at least the group of pre-pubescent kids in front of us did. I thing it was mainly a ploy to get the big screen cameras to zoom in on them, and with the amount of unsuitable hip grinding going on it is surprising that they didn't.
The range of reactions from the crowd took me back a little. There was some clapping and cheering from the Rochester fans, (they scored four times), a lot of gasping and groaning from Crunch fans (after about a million shots on goal they scored once), and a seemingly continuous banging together of the inflatable, plastic sausage things. There was one moment, however, when the entire arena errupted: the crowd leapt to their feet, they roared, they waved their arms, they stamped their feet, and for a few moments nobody left their seats in search of beer and hot dogs. The occasion? Was it the late appearance of the somewhat lacklustre Crunch cheerleaders? No. Did the concession stands announce that they were no longer selling junk food, only veggies and hummus? No. This is what happened.
Two players collided, there was a stick involved somewhere and a whistle was blown. One pushed the other, he pushed back and it was on. Gloves were thrown on the ice, helmets were torn off and flung, and fists were raised. I kid you not, these two immensely well paid, grown up men from the 21st century circled each other with their dukes up. Then they went for it! Proper fighting! At a sports event between people who were quite old enough to know better! Punching and pulling shirts and more punching.......You can see why the crowd was enjoying it so much, can't you? And the funny thing is, if there is anything at all funny about men behaving this way in front all a paying crowd, is that the unwritten 'Code' means that referees don't have to intervene until or unless the players throw each other on the floor, (which is when the sharp blades they have tied to their feet could inflict some serious damage I suppose), or it is deemed that one of the players has taken enough of a beating. Yikes. It is a draw for the sport apparently and many fans go to watch matches purely for this 'entertainment'. Teams even employ 'goons' especially to fight for them (with little or few penalties inflicted) and a number of fights are prearranged. Prearranged fighting! Now do you understand why Americans don't really enjoy soccer?
