Montreal is where hockey passion plays
Festive weekend feeds city's way of life
MONTREAL — The old building is still standing at the corner of St. Catherine Street and Atwater Avenue looking much the same but missing its mystique. The Montreal Forum was converted into an entertainment center and movie complex after the Canadiens left for brighter lights in a bigger arena.
The Forum these days is without its greatest strength, its character, and has been reduced to one building among many in downtown Montreal. But if you close your eyes and open your mind, imagine Rocket Richard flying down the wing with smoke wafting to the ceiling, you can still walk away with a cultural experience.
It's not always what you see that matters.
It's what you feel.
That's the thing about Montreal, particularly when it comes to hockey. Spend a few days here, and you feel the city's undying passion for their game. Yes, it is their game. They have been kind enough to share hockey with the rest of us. And that's what they did during All-Star weekend.
The NHL All-Star Game itself didn't make Sunday worthwhile. It lost its charm years ago, and the Eastern Conference's 12-11 victory in a shootout was particularly brutal in terms of performance. The fun comes from watching fans in Montreal watch hockey.
The game was held in Montreal this year to celebrate the franchise's 100th anniversary, and fans were going bonkers for the entire weekend. Canadiens winger and Eastern Conference captain Alexei Kovalev was named Most Valuable Player, giving them one more reason to blow the roof off the Bell Centre.
"It's not only now," Kovalev said. "They've been like that since I got to Montreal. I don't remember one day that they wouldn't be so passionate and so excited. It's always exciting to be on the ice and surrounded by all these fans."
Good game, bad game, practice game. It doesn't matter. They were engaged, offering louder cheers for players who enjoy the game as much as they do, such as Alex Ovechkin. Of course, more than 20,000 fans were lined around the corner two hours before the doors opened — not for the game Sunday — for practice Saturday morning.
Fahrenheit temperature: minus-13.
"I've never seen something like that in my career," former Habs great Serge Savard said Sunday. "I think hockey is more popular now than it was in the '70s, when we won four Cups in a row. They had 22,000 people at the workout. You see the people in the streets, people with their cars and their 'CH' flags, the waiting list for season tickets, I've never seen that like it is now."
See, fans don't love the game here. They live for the game. It's obvious from the sweaters encased in ice sculptures near the arena to the hundreds of people waiting for players outside their hotels to the monstrous poster on the side of a building of South Buffalo native and Blackhawks winger Patrick Kane to the tiny tots who participated in pregame ceremonies.
"It's basically like a religion here," Vincent Lecavalier said of his hometown.
No wonder Montreal is populated with so many hockey gods.
The Canadiens have won the Stanley Cup 24 times and sent 44 players to the Hall of Fame in their 100-year history. Richard became the first player to score 50 goals in 50 games and won eight Cups in the 1940s and '50s. Jean Beliveau helped carry them to 10 Cups through the '50s and '60s. Guy Lafleur won five more in the '70s and '80s.
In this town, it gets you a free pass for life.
It was evident Sunday evening when they rolled out the red carpet for Beliveau and Bob Gainey and gave them a standing ovation for a ceremonial faceoff. The Canadiens' rich history walked into the arena when Beliveau, Savard, Lafleur, Dickie Moore and Yvan Cournoyer showed up for the game.
"It's the greatest city for hockey anywhere," Moore said. "Toronto they say is close, but it's really far [behind]. We used to go into Toronto and they cheered Rocket more than they cheered their own players. They wanted him to score a goal, and he had that excitement in him, too."
It's great when the Habs are winning, but it gets ugly when they're not. Ten years ago, the franchise was in such poor shape that they couldn't find a local investor interested in buying them. Vail, Colo.-based businessman George Gillett purchased the team and the building, and he helped turn things around.
Long gone are the days when the Canadiens were perennial contenders, but that feeling is back because fans sense another Cup this season. The Bell Centre is starting to sound like the Forum did in its heyday. Lecavalier received the loudest ovation when he was introduced with rumors flying that he'll become Montreal's missing piece.
Fans can only imagine.
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