A Day to Remember...

Devils 0: Islanders 4

So, where on Earth to begin with this post?

A week ago, a lovely person I know named Emily, aka vulcansmuse on Twitter, Facebook messaged me about perhaps making it to an NHL Tweetup, where hockey fans on Twitter get together and have a grand old time watching the game and talking about everything. I said, "Sure, let me see if Christine is up for it," and before I knew it, I was headed for my first ever NHL GAME, let alone the Tweetup.

So, Monday morning comes, and I wake up as excited as a kid on Christmas morning. I do everything I need to do, shower, pull on a gray long sleeved shirt and my blue Mark Streit tee, and hop on the L train to meet Christine. After a bit of walking around trying to find a Starbucks (that I honestly for the life of me COULD NOT FIND), we find each other and set off on our epic journey... to Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum.

Let me just say right now, perhaps the best part of the entire trip was the GPS. It speaks to you in this robotic female British accent, and pronounces "Street" "S-T" when it's abbreviated. Not only that, but it got us confused more than once, throwing us first onto the LIE, then onto the Grand Central Parkway. I think it might have wanted us to get into an accident or something. Thankfully, however, we got to the barn in one piece, and once I got there, I was transfixed.

Okay, so the Coliseum needs a ton of work. That we know. But I had never been there. And after seeing it so many times on TV, I never in my life thought that one day I would actually be there. So in spite of the narrow concourse and steep stairs, and the packed parking lot that made us worry we wouldn't be able to get tickets, once we got into the actual arena, my heart leapt. I actually ran up to see what was going on before Christine told me we had to wait until the whistle. Still, I couldn't believe my eyes; Martin Brodeur was right there on our end of the ice, and the Moulson-Nielsen-Hunter line was forechecking with a vengeance. At this point, it was already 2-0, and Moulson had scored his first of the day, along with the player I was repping, Mark Streit.

The rest of the game was amazing. The Devils looked somewhat flat and uninspired, while the Isles really took it to them. Josh Bailey and Moulson (again) would score before it was over, and Rick DiPietro made 20 saves to pitch his first shutout of the season. It was a game that I can hardly believe I was at, even now, and one that I will relive in my head (and on my iPod- I have a 30-second piece of the game recorded, yay for new iPod nano!) for weeks. And during the second intermission I met up with Emily, Nick (LetThereBeLH) and Mike (tavarescountry), all cool people who I saw again at the Tweetup.

Best part of it all? Hearing people honking their horns to "Let's Go Islanders!" on their way out of the Coliseum. I love hearing fans celebrate like that, and it made me feel really happy- like I was a part of something big. That's a wonderful feeling.

On to the Tweetup we went after a quick Starbucks run, and we had a bit of a problem getting into the place at first- I tried going through a door that wasn't a door (don't ask). Once we got into the Main Event in Plainview, though, we met more great people- Doug (NYIsles10), Katrina (Katrina_Doell), Carlos (SpeakoftheDevs), Vanessa (hkygrl12), Colleen (ctull13), and of course Dani, the hostess (dani3boyz), among others. We had some great conversation and laughed a lot, and they made us feel right at home. Time pretty much flew by, and we left at almost 9 feeling content. And we had trouble leaving the place as well (the door just would not open!).

On the way home, we laughed once more at the GPS and cracked some silly jokes about hockey player names, both of us fairly tired and ready to just go to sleep like babies. I give Christine tons of credit and appreciation- she came out from New Jersey yesterday morning, to go out to Long Island with me for the day, to go back into the city and go home. That is a Brendan Witt type of resilience right there. Kudos and many thanks to my wonderful co-blogger for taking me on this crazy, awesome adventure, and here's to a few more! :D

LET'S GO ISLANDERS!!!

Notes: The Isles outshot New Jersey 46-20 and went 1-4 on the PP... Moulson had 7 shots on goal and the first star of the game... P.S. The Isles have to do something about the display on the screen that winds around the top of the Coliseum after a goal. The players' eyes peeking up just over the edge? That looks kind of weird. No offense... Jeff Tambellini, Nate Thompson and Martin Biron were all healthy scratches for the Isles.