CBC-Sports

Outdoor game brings back childhood memories for Marc Savard

December 31, 2009 07:22 PM | Posted by   Scott Morrison  

BOSTON - Marc Savard remembers growing up in Orleans, a small community near Ottawa, spending every minute he could on a frozen outdoor rink playing hockey.

“That’s all I did,” the Boston Bruins centre said Thursday. “Until I got my report card. Then I was shut down for a while.

“I remember when I was 13 being out there every day shoveling the rink and opening and closing the shack. Someone asked me today if I shoveled during practice (Thursday) and I said ‘no chance, I retired from that when I was 13’.”

Players get out their shovels

Savard and the Bruins were the first to take to the ice yesterday at historic Fenway Park in preparation for Friday’s Winter Classic (CBC, CBCSports.ca 1 p.m. ET.). And just a few minutes before they did, a grey, damp morning turned into a blustery, white winter wonderland. Heavy snow fell as the Bruins practised, the players a few times having to grab shovels to clear the rink.

“I felt like a kid again,” said Savard. “It’s like I had never missed a day.

“I used to skate on the Rideau Canal (in Ottawa). My dad use to say he’d drop me off, send me on a breakaway and pick me up at the other end.”

It was all smiles and chuckles and memories Thursday for the both the Bruins and Philadelphia Flyers, the visitors returning after practice for a lengthy skate and playtime with family and friends.

“I had the time of my life,” said Flyers winger Scotty Hartnell. “I even bought a new camera to make sure I got lots of pictures. It was just so cool to be skating out there, to look up and see the Green Monster (the left field wall), think about all the home runs hit over it, it was surreal. I had a smile on my face the whole time.”

A slice of Canadiana

Indeed, the Winter Classic has alternately become the NHL’s very own slice of Canadiana, if you will, and a cash cow in the process. Oh, it might also be the cause of great angst overnight, because as the revelers were welcoming 2010, the forecast was supposed to switch from dreaded rain to heavy snow, though they anticipate a break in the afternoon, followed by more snow on Friday night.

So it might just be another perfect storm for the NHL.

“Right now there’s no mention of rain,” said Bruins general manager Peter Chiarelli. “That’s good.”

No one really wanted to talk about the possibility of weather interrupting proceedings Friday, either. A few years ago in Buffalo there was a dusting of snow later in the game that made it a postcard setting, but was also close to causing serious problems. A year ago in Chicago the day was grey and cool, perfect in other words. And what Friday brings, well, it will take a major weather issue to force the game to be pushed back to Saturday.

Outdoor game in Canada

The bottom line, of course, is the NHL wants the show to go on because it has been so wildly successful, from the Heritage Classic in Edmonton, to the first Winter Classic in Buffalo, to Chicago, to Boston, to whatever the next stop will be.

Earlier in December, the NHL board of governors discussed the idea of playing two games next season, one on the now traditional Jan. 1 and a second in February, perhaps linked to CBC’s Hockey Day in Canada. The latter is believed to be destined for Calgary, which was in the running a year ago, but the board never got around to voting on a second date.

“There’s no question,” said Savard. “Canada deserves one of these games.”

He is right, too.

True, there is the fear of overkill with any event that works, that too much of a good thing spoils the charm. But because the league has only one traveling ice-making plant a doubleheader is out of the question. Because television ratings are so strong in the U.S. the league will always want a New Year’s matchup for NBC, which makes perfect sense.

But there is also no reason why Canada should be excluded. There doesn’t have to be a game every year in Canada and obviously you would run through the sites in a half-dozen years, but having even the occasional game in the Great White North is not a bad thing because frozen ponds and hockey are so much about what we’re about. And it will be a perfect storm.

But whatever the future holds, there is still a Classic to be played, three points to be had, and on Friday the NHL may first have to weather the storm in Boston.

“It’s going to be so cool,” said Savard. “(Thursday) I felt like a ball player being out there, even though I was on ice.”

" Previous Post | Main
  •