End Games

  College basketball came to a not-so-thrilling end on Monday night. That’s because the game was one-sided. Sure, the 69-63 final score made it feel like the game was a close one, but it really wasn’t. 

U Conn’s hope of another miracle over a top-tier opponent never materialized. Largely because the height and athleticism of the Wolverines never let the Huskies get untracked. 

U Conn statistics show the troubles that they had against a superior team. U Conn shot 21 for 68, which included making 9 of 33 three point attempts. The Huskies added 12 free throws made out of 16 attempts. 

Michigan made the same number of shots in just 55 attempts. The Wolverines were putrid from beyond the arc, making only 2 shots. 

The difference was at the foul line where Michigan converted 25 of 28 free throws. Because U Conn fouled too much due to Michigan’s height and speed. 

Michigan deserved to win this tournament. They trampled on all of the teams they faced, including vanquishing a very good Arizona squad in the semi-finals. Hail to the Victors. 

On the women’s side, UCLA continued to show how good a team it was when it trampled South Carolina for the national title. That was an inevitable outcome, given that South Carolina had put everything into an emotional defeat of previously-undefeated U Conn in the semi-finals. 

Unfortunately, that matchup on Friday night produced an ugly post-game confrontation between storied U Conn head coach Geno Auriemma and South Carolina’s worthy adversary, Dawn Staley. Whatever the reasons, whether Auriemma had a legitimate gripe with Staley over pre-game handshakes or it was frustration which got him steamed, the two Philadelphia natives acted out on the grand stage. It was bad and not good for women’s basketball. 

In DIII action, the University of Mary Washington downed Emory University on a last-second put back of an errant shot. The euphoria which followed was a nice contrast to the ugliness of the Auriemma-Staley tiff and the relatively uncompetitive Final Four for the DI men. 

Remaining in Division III, kudos to the Hamilton men’s hockey team. The Continentals knocked off top-seeded and prohibitive favorite Hobart in overtime to win the 2026 title.

That provides me with a segue into what my family and two friends were up to this weekend. Hockey. 

But not just any hockey game. A game with one meaning to us and a far different meaning to the two teams who had tangled the night before.

We were in Montreal. Montreal might be to hockey what baseball is to Yankee Stadium or football to Green Bay. The meccas of the sport. 

Until 1967, there were only six teams in the National Hockey League. Four located were in the United States (New York, Boston, Chicago and Detroit) and two in Canada (Montreal and Toronto). So the teams played each other a lot over the course of a season. 

My first exposure to the NHL was watching Saturday afternoon games televised on CBS. More often than not, the teams hosting the contests were Boston, Detroit and Chicago. I thought of the Olympia in Detroit, Chicago Stadium and Boston Garden as revered places. 

Montreal and Toronto were fixtures on Saturday nights in their respective buildings, with the games broadcast on CBC, the Canadian national television network. (We didn’t get any New York Rangers games on CBS because the team was bad and the ownership preferred to try to maximize the live gate, which meant no local TV). As historical as the American arenas were, the Montreal Forum and Maple Leaf Gardens in Toronto were hallowed ground. 

I became intimate with the players of the era. Gordie Howe, Bobby Hull, Terry Sawchuck and Glenn Hall were stars in Detroit and Chicago. Occasionally we would see a game with Montreal or Toronto, whose stars included the Mahovolich brothers in Toronto and  Jacques Plante, Jean Beliveau and a lot of other French-sounding names. 

My first live hockey game was on my ninth birthday. It was a Chicago Blackhawks-New York Rangers at the old MSG on 8th Avenue and 49th Street. My eyes were wide open the entire time. NYR won 6-2. I became a true Rangers fan that day. 

My hockey thirst was satisfied with the games which were aired on WOR, Channel 9 in New York. They aired on Saturday nights mostly from Canada, with the teams taking the train overnight to New York for the second clash. I knew all of the players. 

I kept my keen interest in hockey as the NHL expanded with six more franchises in 1967. I watched the national games on NBC and ABC. 

As the league expanded again, I became enthralled with the new team in the area—the New York Islanders. Their away games were televised just like the Rangers. I eventually made it to the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum multiple times to see the Isles host Washington, Montreal, Pittsburgh and the Rangers. 

When I had the opportunity, I went in for Rangers season tickets. For 10 years I watched the Rangers at the Garden host everybody. The battles with the Islanders and Flyers were special. 

So were the players. Esposito. Greschner. Duguay. Davidson. Maloney. Beck. Cable TV let me see all of the games, so I was never at loss for hockey. 

Through the years the Rangers got better. The atmosphere was electric and loud. I made the trek into Manhattan and knew the best ways and times to get in, find street parking and get back through the Lincoln Tunnel to New Jersey. 

Life ended my affair with the Rangers as a season ticket holder. I had a wife and child (the second one would come soon) and the demands of work simply wouldn’t let me have the free time necessary to go anymore. 

Then the Colorado franchise was relocated to New Jersey. To a new arena in the New Jersey Meadowlands. 

They weren’t very good. Seats were available. I had friends who would take me. And finally I had a small share of a partial plan for the games. My allegiance shifted. 

This allowed me to see the glory years of the franchise. I was present in 1996 when the team swept the Detroit Red Wings and paraded the Stanley Cup around the ice. It was an incredible night, one seared in my mind forever. 

I was now a New Jersey Devils fan for life. The New York Rangers were the hated enemy. 

Whether at the Continental Airlines Arena (formerly the Brendan Byrne Arena named after the sitting NJ Governor) or now at the Prudential Center in Newark, I felt the joy and enthusiasm of the home crowd. 

I embraced this love for the team by taking my children to games. Which I still do in various ways. I went this season with my daughter and wife to see the Capitals play the Devils. 

Which is why I am writing about my most recent Devils game. It was this past Saturday night. It kept me from seeing the NCAA Men’s Semi-Finals. 

The Devils were in Montreal. I was with family and friends at the Bell Centre, the successor to the Forum. And I couldn’t have been happier. 

How did this come about? My son convinced me to go see the Devils in either Toronto or Montreal, knowing how I felt about the game and its roots. 

I picked Toronto, a city I had been to twice previously, largely because it was English-speaking and I had a somewhat unpleasant language-barrier experience in Montreal in 1983. Besides, I felt more comfortable in Toronto and liked its cleanliness and big city atmosphere. 

We have been to the Air Canada Centre twice—once to see the Devils lose to the Leafs and then many years later, on a whim, we saw Montreal and Toronto tangle in a memorable 0-0 game in regulation, won by the Leafs in OT. I was stunned by the number of Montreal jerseys worn in enemy territory.  

We had such a great time in Toronto despite the Devils losing. We went to the Ontario Parliament. I stopped to watch criminal court—wigs on the judge and attorneys. My son hit his favorite South African eatery—Nando’s (he spent a semester in college and as summer during law school over there). All this despite having a shoulder injury which limited me a little. 

Based on a comment from him offering to go see the Devils play in all Canadian cities, the Sperber Canadian Hockey Tour was born. It sounded crazy as much as it could be glorious. 

Off we went to Edmonton, where we landed in Restaurant Week—and found Nando’s again. The Devils won that game and we enjoyed Rogers Place, definitely the most beautiful arena on our tour. 

We continued on to Vancouver. Where I became very ill, having eaten something that just didn’t agree with my stomach. Somehow I recovered in time to see the Devils win in a shootout. Chicken noodle soup from a store, a pretzel and Gatorade at the game saved me. While the Rogers Arena once hosted the Olympics, it looked tired and old. 

The same description applied to the Saddledome in Calgary, where it was bitter cold in December. While NJD won the game, we returned to the States with me having a third bout with COVID and my son’s car damaged while parked on the streets of Queens. 

I liked Winnipeg and the Canada Life Centre downtown. I barely avoided a brawl with a restaurant host before the Sunday night game, as he inappropriately chided me about my NJD jacket. NJD won again. 

An enjoyable stop was snowy Ottawa in January. We toured Parliament and the Supreme Court. We trekked to the Canadian Tire Arena way outside town to see another NJD loss. 

What was left was the pinnacle of hockey fandom. Montreal loves its Canadiens. It’s everything to them—since the Expos are long gone, having relocated to Washington, D.C. playing baseball under an assumed name. 

Bleu, Blanc and Rouge jerseys and emblems abounded throughout the city. The civic pride regarding their team—“Les Habitants”, which translates to the residents—was enormous. 

We arrived at the Bell Centre early. The place was abuzz. All around the outside were reminders of who excelled wearing the Canadiens jersey and plaques memorializing the 24 Stanley Cup championships. 

The corridors were packed with fans. Three-quarters of the stands were full before warmups began. Chants arose early—“Let’s Go Habs” reverberated around the building. The organist performed for nearly an hour before the start of the game. 

It was a huge thrill to sing the Canadian National Anthem in French. I thought of the famous singer Roger Doucet who sang it at the Forum in my youth. 

The atmosphere was unlike any regular season game I had attended. It was more like a playoff game. Loud, partisan and electric. 

New Jersey won the match by a 3-0 score. They have won an amazing 11 in a row at the Bell Centre. Montreal fans let NJD and Olympic star Jack Hughes know they disliked him for sending the Canadian Olympic team to defeat in Milan in February. They cheered heartily when he made a mistake or was hit with a hard check. 

While I sampled the cuisine at Montreal Bagel and Schwartz’s Deli, a landmark eatery partially owned by Celine Dion, I still wasn’t enamored with the city. Perhaps the cold, rain, sleet and snow had something to do with it, along with the lack of buds on any trees? 

Yet my son and I finished our “Tour de Canada” thoroughly convinced that Montreal was the best venue—by a mile. Having been to hockey-crazed places in the US and Canada, there was no comparison. 

We had to wait a long while due to intervening illnesses and surgeries. That wait made this trip more special in terms of the overall experience of Montreal Canadiens hockey. 

Am I done traveling to see hockey? Not quite. I have seen the Bruins and Rangers play. Montreal and Toronto, too. That leaves Chicago and Detroit for me to complete a cycle within the Original Six teams. As for the Devils, road games in Philadelphia and maybe Las Vegas await; I have seen the team play at MSG, on Long Island and in Pittsburgh. 

Final victory tally: NJD 5-2; OTT 1-0; TOR 1-1; MTL 0-2; WIN, CGY, EDM & VAN 0-1. Best cities: Ottawa, Toronto and Winnipeg. Top fans: Montreal, Edmonton & Toronto. 

The NCAA’s and NJD-MTL have one thing in common. They were end games.