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According to the Minneapolis Star Tribune, the NHL’s 2nd Winter Classic will be played at Wrigley Field. The game, played on New Year’s Day again, features two original six teams in the hometown Chicago Blackhawks and visiting Detroit Red Wings.The Blackhawks are a young team full of talent. Rookie Patrick Kane led the team in points last year while teammate Jonathan Toews was third in points after missing a quarter of the season. Chicago has also signed G Christobal Huet and D Brian Campbell this offseason to try and piece together a winning team.
On the other hand, the Red Wings are the 2008 Defending Stanley Cup Champions. They added superstar winger Marian Hossa during free agency to build a roster more than capable of repeating as Cup Champions.
One thing to keep in mind is Detroit’s record against Chicago last season. The Blackhawks owned the Red Wings in the early part of last season taking the first four games of the season series and ended up winning it 5-3.However, statistics are always thrown away by teams, especially the bad ones. They mean nothing when two teams are placed in unfamiliar conditions and told to compete at the same level.
The NHL did an excellent job last year in preparing the ice for their first Winter Classic. There were a few problems with holes on the ice (which occasionally happens in indoor games) that just took a little longer to fix than normal. Of course, they couldn’t control the snowfall or else conditions would have been almost perfect.
The Winter Classic not only provides some of the greatest excitement in the game for the fans and players, but it also allows the NHL to promote hockey itself. While the coverage on NBC is not as great as what ESPN used to provide, it puts the biggest spectacle of the year (other than the Cup Finals) on a national station for America to see.
This, no doubt, is great for the league. While the diehard college football fan may be watching the Rose Bowl, most of America will at least tune in to see part of the game, be a few seconds, minutes, a period, or the entire game. Exposure is what the NHL still needs, and in this case, they are getting it.
It can’t get much better when the face of the league scores in the shootout to win the game as Sidney Crosby did last year. Maybe Kane, Toews, or even Red Wing killer Patrick Sharp will take that place this year, adding to the excitement of the game.
While some say that the Winter Classic is just a spectacle, or the game shouldn’t count because it isn’t “normal” conditions or a genuine game, I strongly disagree. Yes, it is a great spectacle. But as the pace of last year’s game proved, it is just as much of a game as any other. Both teams are put at the disadvantage, if there is one, and no less is thrown into winning the game than any other.
It isn’t as if the NHL throws two teams on a pond and says, play for two points. All the rules apply. The league spends a week or two before the game preparing the field and laying the ice, making sure everything is in tip top condition. The game may have a slower pace because of snow, guys may skate slower at times, but at the end of the game the same amount of intensity, if not more, is thrown into winning the two points both teams will need in the standings.
Whatever the outcome is this year, I’ll be watching. While the league prays for perfect clear skies, some of the players won’t mind a little snow to remind them of the good ole days growing up with pond hockey. The 2nd annual Winter Classic WILL be a good one, lets just hope AMP shows more commercials like this:
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