As promised earlier this past week, I returned to college hockey, specifically UConn @ Sacred Heart, just near downtown Bridgeport, CT, which, having only passed through there in the past to get to places like Boston, I had a feeling it would be worse than places like Stamford, just west of there, or places like Hartford or New Haven just to the east, but not nearly as abandoned/run-down as I noticed yesterday evening - like, even the worst neighborhoods in places like Newark, N.J., or parts of the Bronx/Brooklyn/Queens look better than downtown Bridgeport, at least in my opinion... anyway, game recap incoming:
The arena itself sits in the "Harbor Yard" complex just off downtown, which makes sense, considering Long Island Sound is literally right next door to the arena/ballpark there, and, inside, the place almost feels stuck back in the 1990s - at least when UConn moved into the former Hartford Civic Center (now the "XL" Center) back in 2014, the place got renovated, with a new video board and refreshed concourses; in contrast, the only new part of the Webster Bank Arena in Bridgeport seems to be the scoreboard! That being said, I'm sure that place would look at least similar to, if not superior than, the XL Center, if only it had been built in someplace like Norwalk or Stamford, right near Bridgeport along I-95/the "Northeast Corridor" train lines...
There seems to be a surprisingly loyal, however small it might be, fanbase for Sacred Heart, as there were enough UConn fans there to be heard (which the team itself seems to have embraced, calling itself the "ice bus" on social media, in reference to the proximity to most of its conference foes), yet not nearly the majority, which is ironic considering UConn faced Maine in Bridgeport last January (which I honestly would've considered making the trip for, had I not been in a certain other place that week...), although UConn had the first 10 shots of the game, yet couldn't convert on any of them, while it only took Sacred Heart its first two shots to open the scoring about 10 minutes into the game, but, afterward, UConn kept pressing Sacred Heart shot-wise, except that Sacred Heart scored again as UConn kept racking up shot after shot near the end of the period! Surprisingly, also, considering how many shots UConn seemed to get early on, there was only a single penalty, which Sacred Heart managed to kill off, taking a 2-0 lead back to the dressers despite almost getting doubled on shots...
The middle of the game was when a few more penalties got called, as both teams got penalized a few times then, although mostly Sacred Heart, and Sacred Heart stretched the lead to 3-0 just before the halfway point of the period, followed by UConn finally getting somethin
On top of there seemingly being very little decor that had been updated since the late 1990s, the arena has a small Irish pub on-site, called the Limerick Pub, neither school's band appeared, and the arena has a rather unique bells/"flashing lights" intro to each period, when Sacred Heart takes the ice for the start of either the game, or a certain period, and the scoreboard received very little use aside from showing live action/replays - no game highlights/"upcoming event" promos during the intermissions; very few "player profiles" after the introductions; a few promotions for other Sacred Heart sporting teams (most of which actually made the trip from campus to the arena); local business advertisements, none of which were actually in Bridgeport... What it did do, though, was be fair to UConn when the Huskies scored their lone goal of the game, as it showed the replay in the exact same fashion it showed replays for Sacred Heart throughout the game, from goals, to penalties and saves!
Also, in a follow-up from a few days ago, it's truly over now for Sears Canada:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?
...and the mayor of the town containing the original Sears location in all of Canada has offered to help employees displaced by the shutdown get their earnings:
(also, can anybody explain this at all?)
The cruise, now that it's back on with slight changes, instead of being postponed, will take up the remainder of this month, though, so it looks like the earliest I'll be able to get back to anything sporting-related at this point will be next month (November), and, honestly, I'm thinking about all the Saturday afternoons UConn will be at home then (11/4 v. Vermont; 11/11 v. Ohio State; 11/18 v. UMass Lowell, all in Hartford, all starting shortly after 3:30), since, then, I would only need to get to Quinnipiac (Hamden, CT) to complete all the "major" Connecticut rinks!
(P.S.: I've attached part of UConn's "media guide" for this season, which gives an idea (based on a 7:05 P.M. face-off) of how pre-game/intermissions usually go there!)
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