Let me start off by saying this. I like the Bloomington Prairie Thunder hockey team. I think it's a great asset for B-N. Even though the level of play is just above high school. The players do the best with what they have. I like the coliseum and the fact that I can get 312 for roughly the same price as Bud Light. Ok, the beer prices could be lower but I understand I'm at a sporting event.
With that said, there is a noticeable difference between the Thunder and the Peoria Rivermen. For those of you unaware of the Rivermen, it is the direct feeder team to the St. Louis Blues. Essentially, it is AAA hockey, and boy does it show. Crisp passing, fast skating, just superior play all around.
Thursday night my brother called to say he had free tickets to the Thunder so we gladly went. This is probably our 4th or 5th game this season and I'm pretty sure the Thunder has lost all of the ones we attended. Nonetheless, it was free and we had a good time. The Thunder really stunk up the place in the 1st and 2nd periods. Only in the 3rd did we start to show some fight. Speaking of, what does it take to get a decent enforcer on the team? Several times we were on the receiving end of some beat downs. I'm not saying we need to start a goon squad but we could use one of the Hanson brothers.
Fast forward to Saturday. To celebrate Rachel's friend Amy's birthday we were going to the casino boat in Peoria. Then, Rachel's other friend (yes, she has two) Stacey's boyfriend Brian (you following this) came up with 6 free tickets to the Rivermen. So, we went to the Rivermen game, three rows behind the corner glass. NICE! The game was great, lots of back and forth action, lots of physical play. And the game seemed in the bag with the Rivermen up a goal when, like a movie, the other team scored a goal with 1.8 seconds to play. Yes, you read that correctly, 1.8 seconds. Then we had a 5 minute overtime with several close plays. Still tied we went to a shootout, which, I'm happy to report, the Rivermen won.
After that, we went to the boat where I won $20 at the blackjack table and then proceeded to people watch.
One more thing. When we sat down at the game in Peoria there was some drunk redneck with his unbranching family tree behind us. He seemed to be quite concerned with who was homosexual. He also talked in that voice where you don't move your lips much and it sounds like a vaguely familiar foreign language. Kind of like Robert Duvall in any of his Westerns, only drunk on ether. Needless to say, I took great pleasure in making fun of the guy. Don't worry, I used big words. It was also my birthday present to Amy since she takes great joy in my alcohol-fueled heckling.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment