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Hockey Love, Pt. 2: Make Us Love…The Atlanta Thrashers
By Jay Busbee | April 13, 2007
Continuing with the hockey love here at SGS…the Thrashers are down 1-0 in the playoffs, but judging from last night’s performance, this series might last 243 games. Since our hockey knowledge halted with Guy Chouinard, Eric Vail, Tom Lysiak, Boom Boom Geffrion and the rest of the Atlanta Flames, we brought in our pal Scott Barber to help educate us. Scott is one of the two or three people on earth who still doesn’t have a blog, but don’t hold that against him. He’s also a hockey lunatic, and here to preach the Thrasher gospel:
Are the Atlanta Thrashers any different from any other hockey team? Sure! We had the fighting days of our first coach, Kurt Frasier, back when the only good thing to come out of a game was if you were keeping track of who won the fights. Jeff Odgers, nicknamed “The Sheriff”, is a tough man for someone that size and will always have respect among the hockey world. Then came Bob Hartley to coach our team. This gave the team legitimacy: a real team needs a real coach. Then the year when we began to add real players, with the likes of Danny Heatley, to our team. Then came the night of September 29, 2003, where all of hockey took a step back and realized there was more to life than hockey, when Dan Snyder was taken from us in a truly unfortunate accident. How could the Thrashers stay focused after that? Then the year of rotating goaltenders. Never in the history of a professional team have 6 different goaltenders gone down in the same season. It got so bad that Hartley started to dress some of the 16-18 year old goaltenders from the local travel team.
So, what makes this team different? Could it be that 27 years to the day that the last professional hockey game was played in Atlanta, April 12, 1980, we now have the first playoff game in Atlanta for these Thrashers — April 12, 2007? Could it be that the last game played in Atlanta was against these same N.Y. Rangers? Twilight Zone material? Could it be that Scott Mellanby has willed his 40-year-old body to lead a group of youngsters to the hallowed ground of obtaining Lord Stanley’s cup? He currently leads the longest playing list without lifting the Cup among active players. This is the same miracle that Ray Bourque (at right) performed in the 2001 playoffs, hoisting the cup after 22 years in the NHL and at the same age of 40.
Is this a team of destiny? For us die-hard Thrashers fans, we can only hope so. Don’t get me wrong, anyone who has played in a hockey tournament knows that blood, sweat, broken bones, stitches and pain are the paving stones on the road to hoisting Lord Stanley’s cherished cup. No matter who the team is that gets their names on the cup, the goaltending must be on fire and desire to win must be unmatched. Like Ray Bourque did with the Colorado Avalanche, Scott Mellanby must will this team to never give up!
The Hockey legend Bob Johnson once said: “It’s a great day for Hockey, boys!” In The South!
Topics: Make Us Love..., hockey, Thrashers |
