CLEVELAND, Oh – Sitting in Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland, Ohio might conjure up recent memories of Lebron James and the NBA’s Cleveland Cavaliers losing to the Golden State Warriors but to the fans sitting in the arena on this night in mid-October have anything but basketball on their minds. The Lake Erie Monsters, the AHL affiliate to Ohio’s other professional hockey team, the Columbus Blue Jackets, played against the Iowa Stars who are affiliated with the Dallas Stars. The Stars won tonight’s game in a shootout 1-0.
To those of us old fogies, who can still remember the 1970’s, there was a brief moment when the NHL was as much a part of Cleveland as the current tenants are in the “A”. The Cleveland Barons played only two seasons in 1976-77 and 1977-78 and did not make the playoffs winning only 47 times in 160 games and never had a record over .500. Eventually they merged with the Minnesota North Stars who eventually moved to Dallas, which is a tad ironic on this night considering Iowa’s affiliation.
To the typical non-hockey and casual hockey observer, the label “non-traditional hockey market” would be uttered but as usual they would be wrong. The sport of hockey goes back as far as 1922 in Cleveland and were a part of several leagues including previous stints in the AHL.
Two banners hang in the rafters from the Barons with the names Johnny Bower and Fred Glover on them. Bower is known to many as a hall of fame goaltender with the Toronto Maple Leafs. Glover played 15 seasons with the Barons winning five Calder Cups and has several AHL records. He was also a part of the Detroit Red Wings Stanley Cup winning team in 1952 but was not active for the playoffs.
No one can complain about the attendance in Cleveland. Fans support has been more than solid coming in third in attendance last season behind only the Hershey Bears and the Providence Bruins respectively. Not bad for a franchise that has been back in the AHL since 2008 and has only been to the playoffs once and lost in the first round the one time they did make it.
It is always good to see hockey being played regardless of the venue or the city its being played in. Playing in Quicken Loans Arena reminds one of the Philadelphia Phantoms who use to reside at the Wells Fargo Center in south Philly. A good size crowd that looks small in an NHL size arena but is a beautiful site in a hockey fans eyes.
On Sunday, the NFL takes center stage in the city on Lake Erie. Still, make no mistake about it. Cleveland, you rock hockey and you rock it well.
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