Winter Classic - We’re just a few hours away!
It’s now 6PM and I have been at Ralph Wilson Stadium for almost six hours. I listened in to Pittsburgh coach Michel Therrien and star forward Sidney Crosby address the media after the Penguins practice, and they both echoed the same sentiments that their Buffalo counterparts had said earlier in the afternoon.
Asked about savoring the experience, Crosby replied “Yeah, definitely. I think that’s natural. We’ve all played outside at some point and had a great time doing it. I think it brings you back a bit when you’re out there. You know, someone said before, it is a big stage. You know, it’s a big game. It’s a regular season game. But at the same time, you don’t get this chance very often, so you want to enjoy it.” Coach Therrien commented on what he expects out of the game. “The only thing probably our shifts should be shorter, but not the way you’re supposed to play. It’s so tough to try to sell one system. So you come in the day of the game like this and you try to change the way you’re supposed to play and you could end up to be in trouble pretty quickly. We’re going to concentrate on doing the things that we’ve been preaching since day one: Playing our system. We got to make sure we’ve got to be disciplined. We got to play to win the hockey game. I know there’s a lot of attention to that game, but on our standpoint we got to win this game.”
Therrien indicated that former Sabres netminder Ty Conklin will most likely get the start in net.
So I am going to wrap it here for tonight and head home, and I got to say I had a blast here doing this. Being a part of the media experience and being able to report on the day’s events and be a part of the “go go” professional environment is something that most people would dream of having a chance to do, and here I am doing it. This is my RWS pressbox debut and I got to say it is cool just being here. YaY for me!
Tomorrow’s plans… going to hook up with The Bfloblog crew for their tailgate, then head over to get set up in the pressbox around 10:30 AM and I plan to liveblog during the event. The puck should drop around 1:20 PM if the elements don’t throw a twist. Pete and his dad will be sitting in sec 135 directly below the pressbox, and after the game we will be heading out for a postgame meal.
Happy New Year to all our readers and supporters. Hope you have enjoyed the Winter Classic coverage here at USRT and on WNYMedia. Tune in tomorrow!
