Blueshirt Banter Discussion: What Does Hockey Mean To You?

Born and raised in Brooklyn, a black kid should love basketball or football in your neighborhood. I, for one, played both. But, somehow that wasn’t enough for me. Growing up in a large family (youngest of 5 kids), the things I loved seemed minuscule compared to my siblings. But, when I was about 8 years old, during Christmas Break from school, I stayed up to watch The Benny Hill Show. Right after the show, the Rangers came on, playing against the Kings…my first hockey game. Eventually, I fell asleep on the couch, and my mother tucked me into bed. But, not before catching a glimpse herself. Well, one thing was for certain…I found my game.

Four years and lots of game watching later, I was brought Upstate to Rochester, to visit my Uncle Hugh. There, I was given my first chance to skate, and show off moves I tried to learn from the likes of Kelly Kisio and Brian Mullen. It was so exhilarating to do this, that I wanted to leave my mom, and live with my uncle.

Nope…not gonna happen.

I got to play when I was 15, in the Chelsea Piers program; but only for two years. Afterwards, I got swept away by high school, college, military, and family. But my fandom has been riding shotgun the whole way, and has may Lord and Savior.

Make no mistake about it, if I could get back on ice for one more game, you bet I would.

You cried like a little girl at the end of Titanic, didn’t you?

Hockey is my escape. I have a game tonight at 10:55 (WTF!) and will leave for work at 7:00 tomorrow as usual. Most nights I’m in bed around then but for hockey, sleep is not a necessity.
Every Rangers game night, I’m a little happier heading home knowing I get to escape into the game and watch the greatest sport in the world.
When the lockout was over, my then girlfriend said ‘we should get Ranger season tickets"… soon after I said “we should get married”. Now our 2 year old knows the Devils are “yuck” and "Let’s go Rangers – (clap clap clapclapclap)"
I hate the phrase, but nothing else sums it up like this: hockey rules!

Means family to me, specifically it means brotherhood. Hockey, humor, and blood tied me to my brothers though we were greatly different in age. It is our sport, it is the thing we find ourselves discussing and debating more than politics, love lives, or the meaning of life.

What is hockey to me? It is a passion. I love to play the game (when I can) and I love to watch the game. I love to talk about it, write about it, think about it, and play video game versions of it. It is absolutely and completely silly and can be a tremendous waste of time, money, and energy… but it is so much more than a game or a sport to me. I love it, I always have and I always will.

I love the sport im 51 and been folowing the rangers since the 70 . Ibeen through all the ups and downs with this team but always stayed true. when i got out of the service in 81 a year or two i got season tickets sect 415 d1.I was lucky in my life to see the cup 2 years later gave tickets up moved out of ny .I get center ice every year continue to follow rangers . Unfortunate i have trminal cancer and mor the likley never to to see this team grow i just think how lucky that a true long time fans will ejoy this team for years to come. like i said im greatfull to see the cup raised in person i will continue to watch and root for the beast team in hocky with the best fans hope the go all the way this year

and to me, hockey is the purest combination of creativity, speed and power in sports. The game has always intrigued me and what hooked me is the speed of the game and growing up in the early/mid/late 90s I immediately took to guys like Pavel Bure, Sergei Federov, Steve Yzerman, Brenden Shanahan and other high powered offensive players. Then there’s the goaltenders, I don’t know if it was the colorful pads, the crazy mask schemes or the crazy reflexes that caught me but man I could watch two top flight goaltenders make save after save for hours.

In fact one of the best games I ever saw live was a few years ago at MSG with the Rangers facing the Devils and Marty and Henrik were on top form that night almost playing a game of “anything you can do I can do better” until Brenden Shanahan ripped a one timer from the right faceoff dot in OT to win the game 1-0…it was such a great, pure hockey game.

I think that answers this question

Not much of a family history like many others here, hockey was just something I picked up on in ’90 when I was 10. Was a huge Met/Giant fan already because of my Grandfather, and just happened to pick up on hockey. I think I had a great connection to the sport because of its terrific blend of everything in sports: skill, speed, toughness, excitement…and then of course as a Ranger fan: anxiety, disappointment, and ulcers.

I started playing lightly in my early teens, then into some school/travel and pick-up/midnight hockey games until a few work-related injuries forced me into ‘retirement’ :-). I was always the big, lumbering kid who was always stuck on defense, and I took a great liking to popular D of the time and had a large collection of jerseys of those players. Blake, Chelios, Lidstrom, Pronger, Leetch, Beukeboom, Bourque, of the ones I remember.

Now it’s just about my favorite form of entertainment. It’s very difficult to explain it to folks, and the best way is to just have them watch a game, or at best, take them to one. During the warmer months, the outdoors is one of my greatest joys, but during the colder times, hockey is that after-work release, it’s something to believe in, it’s, like Digger said, a passion, that while alien to outsiders, is perfectly understood by those who share it.

i was born in 94 and i dont rememeber watching a rangers game until henrik came up. my dad never put on the games when i was geting into sports cause the rangers were terrible and were on there 7 year playoff slump. ive been a diehard rangers fan ever since after the lockout and there my favorite team. when i was a child i never thought of hockey i always just like football but now i love hockey more and i think i always will.

I was introduced to the Rangers by my dad when he took me to the Garden when I was 4 years old. I’m now 48, live in the midwest and we still talk about the Rangers after every game. He’s 86 ! and has seen 2 Stanley Cup winners since he became a fan. Now my sons and I watch them live or dvr’d via Center Ice.
I played hockey growing up, in HS and in college. It is the best sport there is. And the Rangers, good or bad (mostly bad -but not this year), bring my family together.

Wow, something words cannot describe. Just the feeling it brings to me makes me smile whenever I think about hockey. Grew up with my dad and 3 of my uncles as Ranger fans, and my other 4 uncles as traitor Devil fans. So basically I was always battling my love for the Rangers with my uncles and especially my cousins, all this around the late 90s, so it was hard at times. But not even my love for the Rangers exceeds my love for Hockey.

I love the passion, I love the excitement, the stress, the unbelievable moments. I can’t live without it. Just growing up going to my cousins backyard where there was a pond and playing as a kid, some of those moments I’ll never forget. Playing pond hockey on a cold but sunny afternoon, just beautiful. It really is a tough, stressful, but beautiful game to me. Hockey has some passion that only soccer fans around the world can really understand, people who don’t like Hockey just don’t know that passion. To me, there’s nothing more beautiful than a clean sheet of ice to skate on, that in itself is beautiful. Just the sounds of the skates cutting into the ice, the puck hitting your blade, the sound of the boards when its hit by a puck. I love it.

Then add in the whole fan factor, the sound of an arena on a goal, that moment when you’re in the stands and every fan around you for just those few moments right after a goal is scored are your brothers or sisters…and they all deserve a high five lol!

But just to get right to it, what is Hockey to me? I could say love, passion, pure raw emotion, but I just can’t put it into words.