The Island Experience
This past Saturday I attended my first live game of the season. Panthers at Islanders, Nassau Coliseum.
We were able to get pretty good seats. They were high up, but they were at center ice. We were about 10 minutes early. We grabbed a couple of drinks and hit our seats.
The Islanders start games on Saturday nights at 7pm. Weeknights start time has been changed to 730pm.
The place was half-empty (or full, if that’s your kinda glass). I thought maybe the start time threw people off and they were just going to be LA-like late, but nope, the stands remained randomly scattered with people. It was Halloween weekend, a few people were in costume, so I tossed out the old joke that there must be a lot of people dressed as empty seats.
The Islanders have a serious image problem. It wasn’t hard to hear fans complaining about the team and how it’s run. The same stuff you read in the media. One fan had a “Wang” jersey on with the number 666 on the back.
An 0-3 start did not help deflect the “worst run team” phrase that seemed to be printed and uttered through every media outlet.
But owner Charles Wang doesn’t strap on skates and play and the Islanders have quickly turned their season around. Since those first three loses, the Isles are 5-3, with two of three losses coming after regulation (and three of the wins coming after regulation too, are these guys getting overtime pay?). 12 points in 8 games is far from bad and the Islanders are starting to look more and more like a Ted Nolan-coached team (despite being the only team in the NHL that hasn’t picked up a fighting major yet).
The first month of the season is done and the Islanders are sitting within the 6-10 spot range in the Eastern Conference (five teams are currently tied with 12 points).
The quick turnaround on the ice has not made many believers off of it. With the Blackhawks in town last night the crowd was a reported 8,739. Saturday’s attendance for the game against Florida was a reported 10,455.
Baseball season is over, but the NBA has just started and the NY sports scene is currently about its NFL teams. The Islanders upswing isn’t going to attract attention just yet, but they need attention and they need it fast. I’m sure there will be ticket discounts and giveaways soon, but some major advertising may be in order, and not just about having a good time at a hockey game (your typical hockey ad), but perhaps some news-ish, updated advertising letting the metro area know the Islanders are contenders (as of now). It may be a day-to-day production, but the adjectives being used to describe the Islanders aren’t fit to print in most publications and aren’t accurate either.
Attendance needs to improve or it could start to affect the morale of the team. The Islanders will never top the Attendance charts. They could sell out every game and still be no higher than #18 in the league due to the Coliseum’s capacity of 16,297.
As for the game Saturday night, it wasn’t a bad one. The first period was active, had good flow and was entertaining. Unfortunately the next two periods didn’t match the initial excitement and the crowd became eerily quiet. One thing about a Coliseum crowd: even small, it’s normally loud. The low volume level in the arena in the last two periods reminded me of an out-of-area game, it just didn’t feel right. The Islanders letting up a late goal and having the Panthers tie it up brought the crowd back, but definitely not in a way the team wanted to hear it. Overtime brought some life back to the place and the shootout’s oohs and ahhs definitely woke up anyone having trouble focusing since the first period.
Miroslav Satan started the shootout for the Islanders. He scored, but took a second swing at the puck as he was passing by the net and the goal was called off. Replay showed he completely missed the puck (and Ed Belfour in net) with that second attempt, so the Islanders were awarded the goal. It looked like that was going to be the lone goal of the shootout, but former Islander Olli Jokinen put one by Rick Dipietro on the Panthers last attempt to bring the shootout to “sudden death” rounds (they call it sudden death, but there are last licks).
Six more rounds went by with no goals scored. In the 10th frame Andy Hilbert finally put one by Belfour. Dipietro was able to stop Joel Kwiatkowski and a sigh of relief could be heard before a final cheer.
The game ended on a high note, the fans left happy, but it appears it’s going to take a lot of work to get them to keep coming, and bring a few more friends with them.
Some other Islanders related notes:
* Newsday reported short-term former GM Neil Smith is now a consultant with the Dallas Stars and never saw a cent of salary from the Isles.
* Alexei Yashin isn’t only not being booed, but he was cheered a few times, especially during the shootout. It might be due to him not only looking like a hockey player this season, but looking like one who’s putting forth a lot of effort. If this continues Ted Nolan is going to receive a lot of credit down the line.
* Sean Bergenheim, who was unable to get a deal done with the Islanders over the summer found out how serious Wang is about signing before camp, or not seeing the ice in an Islanders jersey. Bergenheim originally signed with the Lokomotiv Yaroslavl of the Russian Superleague but apparently wasn’t happy playing there. Word is he wanted back on the Island, even if it meant the two-way he was avoiding before. He had to sign before December 1st in order to avoid going through waivers, but apparently he didn’t want to wait as Bergenheim just signed with Frölunda of the Swedish Elite League.
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