Written by Sarah Kyle
So it’s fall. The fans are cheering wildly at the World Series, the end of the baseball season. Almost every college male in America settles down on his couch each Monday night and banters about the beginnings of Monday Night Football. And while football and baseball are both great sports and require a great deal of talent, I’d like to suggest that we turn our attention to a different sport: the great game of hockey.
You see, as most of the guys were mapping out their fantasy football teams and debating over which teams would make it to the World Series this year, I, with a handful of other students, celebrated October as the beginning of the National Hockey League’s regular season.
Now before I say what I’m about to say, let me prevent the angry mobs of men by saying I truly do appreciate football and baseball. The sports all share a physical aspect and a focus on precision. However, there’s just something insanely amazing about the idea of a sport in which the players not only are trying to score points — they’re doing it while skating on ice. The sport incorporates grace, strength, entertainment and warfare into a single entity.
Unlike football, the game has a much more continuous flow of action. Instead of 15 seconds of action and then a minute of deliberation by referees, hockey spectators must stay on their toes and watch minutes of uninterrupted action. It is fast-paced and can change literally at the last minute.
I also truly have an appreciation for the ratings system: So often in sports, no matter how amazing a team does, if it loses in overtime, it gets no credit for even making it to overtime. In hockey, however, games are assigned a point value — with teams earning 0 points for a regular game loss, one for an overtime or shootout lose, and two for a win. I believe that this system better represents the quality and talent of the teams instead of an “all-or-nothing” policy that can be skewed by a lucky goal.
With a regular season spanning from the beginning of October until mid-April, a hockey fan rarely lacks the ability to cheer for their favorite team. With the season spanning six months, it’s hard to make predictions about which team will make it to the Stanley Cup each year — a fact that makes the sport more interesting and exciting to me.
Since I am from Colorado, I’m a huge Avalanche fan and would love to say that I was 100 percent confident that the team is on the road to the Stanley Cup, but the fact is that it is truly too early to tell. With only 19 out of 82 games under their belt, it is impossible to look at the team’s current record of 12 wins and seven losses and say that we’re a shoo-in for the defining championship of the NHL. Likewise, it would be unfair to say that just because our rivals, the Detroit Red Wings, haven’t been doing great thus far that they’ll never make it to the Stanley Cup.
The sport is in a season of changes and new starts, with hockey greats like Joe Sakic of the Avs retiring before the start of the 2009 season. New players and coaches are learning how to work together, as veterans are learning to accept and play with the replacements of those who have retired and moved on. Until this happens, there is no way of knowing which teams the season will favor.
This complexity is part of why I love the sport so much. It’s not black and white, and predictions are virtually impossible to make. It is a game of change, intensity and suspense.
So when you’re sitting down to watch the World Series and planning out your fantasy football teams, consider giving the underdog of the sports world some attention, and turn your mind to the icy greatness of hockey.
