Last night Paul and I made our yearly trek to see his home team, Montreal, play against the Rangers. It was our third year to do this, and the third year he had to watch his team loose.
It was a rough game for the Canadiens. For the first two periods, they were struggling and looking at a shutout. They just couldn’t seem to step it up and get control of the game. The Rangers just kept bringing it to them over and over again. In fact the Canadiens coach, Guy Carbonneau, said as much in the game recap: “They played a really good game, but we just didn’t respond. Our focus wasn’t there, our passing was horrendous, we didn’t skate with the puck, we didn’t put the puck in the right place, and when the puck was there we just didn’t battle for it.” Ultimately, the Rangers won 4-1 with Montreal’s only goal coming in the third period.
There was a row of fans who’d come down from Montreal sitting just in front of us. Paul chatted with them, in French, on off through the game. They had a tough time watching the loss too. A couple of them even defected to the Rangers side, having gone to the Rangers store in the Garden during the second intermission and returning to their seats sporting Rangers attire instead of Montreal.
For me, it was a fun game to watch and great to hang out with Paul. I’m thinking about going to see the Penguins play the Rangers in March. It would be a blast to catch Sidney Crosby on the ice before the season is over.
