SPORT
This One Will Last a Lifetime
/ Pete Hausler
06.21.09
Last Sunday evening, having nothing better to do, I watched an MSG-network re-broadcast of a hockey game that was played exactly fifteen years earlier, on June 14, 1994. As any New York Rangers’ fan will tell you, that was the sweet and sacred day that the Broadway Blueshirts clinched their most recent Stanley Cup, in a nail-biter of a Game 7 over the Vancouver Canucks, to earn their first championship since 1940.
To the uninitiated, i.e., those who don’t get the whole sport thing, it may seem a bit odd to re-watch a game originally played fifteen years ago; but don’t forget that the word ‘fan’ derives from ‘fanatic,’ and no one ever accused fanatics—sports or otherwise—of rational thought or action.
In fact, it’s not so unusual from the standpoint of the television networks who program these so-called classic games. All the major sports networks do this. To name a few, the Yankees’ and Mets’ networks—YES and SNY, respectively—show old baseball games; and ESPN devotes an entire channel, ESPN-Classic, to showing famous and infamous games.
Airing this classic 1994 Rangers game is smart programming for another reason: the 2009 Stanley Cup playoffs had just ended two nights before, with the young Pittsburgh Penguins beating the veteran-laced Detroit Red Wings in their own Game 7. When you follow a sport closely for an entire season, when you watch a game or more per night for the ten-week span that is hockey’s “second season,” believe me, you are jonesing for just one more game.
For this year’s playoffs I, like thousands of hockey fans across North America, had gotten in the habit of flipping on the TV and watching any game that was being shown. It’s what fans do, even if it isn’t your team playing. Ends of seasons are difficult to bear, so watching these classic games are like couch-potato methadone. They extend the season by one more night, with a comforting air of familiarity. With the outcome long-determined, you can watch the game with a more analytical, less emotional bent, with your mind tuned to historical anomalies.
To the uninitiated, i.e., those who don’t get the whole sport thing, it may seem a bit odd to re-watch a game originally played fifteen years ago; but don’t forget that the word ‘fan’ derives from ‘fanatic,’ and no one ever accused fanatics—sports or otherwise—of rational thought or action.
In fact, it’s not so unusual from the standpoint of the television networks who program these so-called classic games. All the major sports networks do this. To name a few, the Yankees’ and Mets’ networks—YES and SNY, respectively—show old baseball games; and ESPN devotes an entire channel, ESPN-Classic, to showing famous and infamous games.
Airing this classic 1994 Rangers game is smart programming for another reason: the 2009 Stanley Cup playoffs had just ended two nights before, with the young Pittsburgh Penguins beating the veteran-laced Detroit Red Wings in their own Game 7. When you follow a sport closely for an entire season, when you watch a game or more per night for the ten-week span that is hockey’s “second season,” believe me, you are jonesing for just one more game.
For this year’s playoffs I, like thousands of hockey fans across North America, had gotten in the habit of flipping on the TV and watching any game that was being shown. It’s what fans do, even if it isn’t your team playing. Ends of seasons are difficult to bear, so watching these classic games are like couch-potato methadone. They extend the season by one more night, with a comforting air of familiarity. With the outcome long-determined, you can watch the game with a more analytical, less emotional bent, with your mind tuned to historical anomalies.