I made a post about this last year about me playing at MSG before a ranger game, sadly it didnt happen last year, but this year my team has a good chance we are. Is there anyone here who has played on the Garden ice and would like to share their story? that would be great!!
I made a post about this last year about me playing at MSG before a ranger game, sadly it didnt happen last year, but this year my team has a good chance we are. Is there anyone here who has played on the Garden ice and would like to share their story? that would be great!!
Can't say anything about MSG, but I can tell you a few things about playing on NHL ice. My HS went to the state championships 2 years in a row when I was on the team, and we played at Continental. Expect the ice to be choppy as hell, especially so at MSG. Lots of bouncing pucks. Also, the ice will probably look huge to you, even though it's standard size, due to the arena.
Can't say anything about MSG, but I can tell you a few things about playing on NHL ice. My HS went to the state championships 2 years in a row when I was on the team, and we played at Continental. Expect the ice to be choppy as hell, especially so at MSG. Lots of bouncing pucks. Also, the ice will probably look huge to you, even though it's standard size, due to the arena.
yea people always talk about how poor the ice quality is, ive been out to center ice for a picture but not on skates. and it looks huge haha. its my all-time dream to skate out there, i cant wait
I played in an organized pickup game at MSG this past March.
Great experience, can't wait to do it again but it is definitely hotter on the ice than it is in most places and the ice gets very soft and choppy through the hour and a half we were out there.
Here is my story from when I did the season suscriber skate back in march...
Quote:
Originally Posted by thesnake
Hey all,
Someone sent me a PM regarding my experience at the Pick Up game yesterday, so instead of just responding there I thought I'd post my thoughts for all to see...
After the game they had everyone go down to section 74 and wait around. We had to wait about 20 minutes or so for the post game press conferences to finish up. Once that was done they let us use the press room to get dressed in. That wasnt so great because it was a bit crowded, and the chairs werent the best to get your hockey equipment on in... but it was not a big deal at all.
While getting dressed they came in and handed out pretty nice reebok pratice jerseys to all the players. They had the NYR crest on them. Half Blue, half White... they had teams already split up.
Once dressed we headed out onto the ice and had about a 10 minute warm up. When the game was ready to go our team had 13 skaters and a goalie. 9 forwards, 4 D... which was good for me as I'm a D man and that meant extra ice for me. I was expecting 6 D so that was a nice surprise.
The game was broken into 3 20 minute periods. They kept the clock running pretty much on stops, but they hurried face offs along so it wasnt wasting a lot of time. They blew the horn and stopped the clock every 2 minutes for a shift change which I though was a great idea. I know when I play open hockey there are always a few guys who refuse to come off the ice... so it was nice to take that problem out of the game right off the bat.
As for the level of hockey... I'd say it was on the low side. I consider myself a middle of the road men's league B/C league player. I'm far from a star in my games, but I can skate/shoot/stickhandle and hold my own. There were a few good players on each team, but there were also some that were not all that great (like, had a hard time getting around). Regardless, it was a fun game.... My team won 9-3, I had 3 assists (which they announce on the PA, which was pretty cool!)
After the game they let you mill around and take pictures and such. One guy had arranged for them to roll the carpet out to center ice where he asked his gf to marry him... that was neat I suppose.
Anyway, to sum it up... I had a blast. Was it worth the $200... for me, no question about it.
IDK if anyone is interested, but here is a link to my pictures that I posted to my fb page...
