Hockey Night in China

With the NHL season now fully underway, I've started to really miss hockey. So I grabbed some friends headed out last night to see the China Sharks, Shanghai's entry in the Asia League of Ice Hockey. It's not anywhere near the NHL (or the AHL, or the ECHL, or even Major Junior) in terms of the level of play, but hey, when you're desperate, you'll take what you can get.

We got there a little late, but the place was already pretty lively by the time we arrived. The arena wasn't anywhere near full (and they were giving away tons of free tickets last week), but people were loud, they cheered in (mostly) the right spots, and everyone seemed to be having a good time. On the downside, only the top half of the arena was open, preventing fans from really getting intimate with the game. It's much easier to fall in love with hockey rinkside than 20 rows up.

Anyways, the game itself was pretty entertaining. The Sharks never led but ended up tying the game at 2 with 19 seconds left, forcing OT and eventually winning on Steve McKenna's shootout winner. Shark captain Adam Taylor scored a nice goal, Harvard alum Kevin Du showed some nice hands, and goalie Wade Flaherty made a couple key saves. On the downside, play was pretty sloppy overall (owing partly to some horrible ice), and a bunch of the scoring chances were the simply result of one guy bobbling the puck past three defenders and shoveling the puck on net. Oh, and not surprisingly, it wasn't a particularly physical game either.

Other quirks:

• The Sharks only dressed 16 or so players. High 1 had at least 18 or 19. (NHL teams dress 20.)
• They ran some go-go dancers cheerleaders out during the 1st intermission.
  
• The rink was so warm that they had the players just skate around for a couple minutes at the beginning of each period to let the ice harden up. We literally had to sit there just watching the ice freeze.
• High 1 (a Korean team) had a Japanese player with dreadlocks (seriously).
  

In the end, I think everyone left the rink pretty happy. The Sharks are still going through some growing pains both in the standings (they're dead last) and in the fan experience category (note to the team: neither the arena nor the beer should be at normal room temperature), but I'll probably be back whenever I'm jonesing for some more hockey.