Open House Night at the Barn
December 13th, 2006 by murph
As mentioned here earlier, the Islanders hosted the first of two “Select a Seat” events at the Coliseum last night. It seems like it was a big success.
More than 1,500 fans took advantage of the opportunity for hand-shaking and bantering. By the end of the session, the Islanders said they had sold more than 300 tickets to their remaining home games and another 500 tickets to a six-game package.
My brother and I arrived around 6:30pm and were surprised to see about 50 cars in the parking lot, certainly more than I expected. We headed downstairs and were greeted by Islanders ticket reps handing out free media guides to everyone. Our ticket rep Tony took us through the doors and into the Coliseum where the available seats were all tagged with orange or white flyers indicating their availability for the 6 or 23 game plans. The ice was fresh, the jumbotron was showing past game highlights, and fans were walking all about the arena with ticket reps, picking their seats. Tony asked us what our seating preferences were and then led us to the end of the ice where the Isles attack twice. There were plenty of seats to choose from, but we quickly settled on a pair of seats in Section 307, Row H in the middle of the row. These seats were about as low as available and only two sections into the end-zone “curve”. I wanted to be as close to the middle as possible, and I didn’t want to be behind the net and have a poor view of the other end of the ice. The seats are technically end-zone seats and were $306 per ticket for the 6 game plan.
The view from Murph’s new seats
I gave Tony my credit card info for the tickets and wrapped things up with him. He had more seats to sell, and we had Islanders to meet! Before we could even make it into the Isles’ locker room, we ran into Mike Bossy!
The Boss signs the 1980 Commemorative Team Puck for my brother
I got The Boss to sign the base of my Bossy McFarlane NHL Legend figure. I think The Boss has a problem with some of these ending up on Ebay. He asked for my name, and signed the base “To Kevin Mike Bossy” writing my name and then signing it as close as possible and even overlapping a little bit. I understand why he does this, but I was a little disappointed in how it came out.
Boss was surrounded by fans old and young everywhere he went. After getting our autographs we headed into the Islanders locker room area, A.K.A. Islanders Fan Heaven. The walls are covered in huge photos of Islanders old and new. We spotted this trophy cabinet on the way in with mini Stanley Cups, Calder Trophies and other awards the Isles’ dynasty won along the way.
Lots of hardware
We turned the corner and ran into $%@! Sparky. He was OK, I think he knows all Islanders fans over age 14 hate him. I promised him I wouldn’t beat him up and he pointed us into the Islanders locker room. Yashin, Hunter and Hilbert were hanging out in there greeting fans.
Hunter and Hilbert waiting for more fans
Introducing the Isles’ new 4th line…Hunter, Murphy, and Hilbert
What’s with the red shoes? Did Yashin lose a bet?
He wasn’t there, but this guy still friggin’ rules!
The guys were happy to take pictures and sign our media guides. Remember when Yashin’s forearm got cut by a skate blade in 2003? The same thing happened to my brother one week after Yashin’s injury, so of course my brother wanted to compare scars and get a picture of the two of them showing them off. Yashin was more than willing to roll up his sleeve for us, except he’s hardly got any scar at all. Apparently the Isles (or maybe Carol Alt?) knows a really good plastic surgeon.
We thanked the guys for their time and headed back out into the hallway. It leads all the way down to the Isles Executive Offices. There we met GM Garth Snow and one of the Ice Girls. Garth said the new job was definitely tougher than his old one with longer hours. His new job has some perks though, he said he got his own office and an Ice Girl. Someone behind us asked Garth if he was available to play goal for his men’s league team, that got a good laugh from everyone. Garth said if they’d match his salary from last year, he’d think about it.
After Garth we realized we missed Coach Nolan’s office so we headed back towards the locker room and ran into the coach. We told him what a good job he’s done so far and to keep it up. On our way out of the Coliseum we ran into The Boss who had just grabbed a cup of coffee. We got one of the security guards to take a picture of my brother, Bossy and myself. We heard Bryan Trottier was hanging around too so I asked Mike if had seen his old friend Bryan and he said Trotts had left for the night. I hope to get that photo signed by Boss the next time I meet him.
More pics…
This great picture from last year’s reunion night is in the locker room hallway
Stick/equipment room. I was very tempted to grab a couple of those blue Easton Synergy sticks as it’s the same stick I use.
This huge mural is in the locker room hallway. It’s got old pictures with all sorts of Islanders history listed on it.
This is the left side of the mural. I could have sworn I took three pictures of it so I could piece it together into one photo, but I didn’t have any pictures of the right-side.
I had no idea GM Snow was that big. I’m 6′4″ so he must be 6′5″.
Any excuse to run pictures of Ice Girls
This photo is on the walls of the executive offices
Along with this Mack-Daddy chair
Murphy, Bossy, Murphy
My full set of photos is here. There are a couple I left out of this post, and I’m also waiting for my brother to send over the ones he has (including Coach Nolan). All in all, it was a great experience and it shows how far the Islanders are willing to go to get fans back in the stands. If you are on the fence about a 6 or 23 game plan, I suggest you head on over to the Coliseum tonight between 5-8p for some hardcore persuasion. You won’t be sorry.
Day 2 of the Select-A-Seat event is Wednesday from 5-8 pm. Miroslav Satan called the Islanders’ offices today and volunteered to be there for the locker room tour from 5 – 6:30. Arron Asham and Bruno Gervais will also be in attendance. FSN color commentator Billy Jaffe will be on hand to talk Islanders hockey. Once again, Ted Nolan and Garth Snow will be in their offices to answer any questions fans may have about the current team. And, as Trottier, Hunter and HIlbert proved on Tuesday, you never know who else might show up on Wednesday.
