I'm On A Zamboni! Oh Yeah, Thrashers Win!

Tuesday Night the Ottawa Senators rolled in to town, complete with Mike Fisher's famous girlfriend, Kerri Underwood. I never actually saw her, but she was up in the suites. The Thrashers need a win like a crackhead needs a hit. Washington embarrassed us. We had Casino Night, maybe we could get back on track!


Warm ups!


The boys skate out.





Elliot: Dude, do you think they are actually going to win tonight?
Leclaire: I doubt it.
Elliot: I'm glad I'm not playing tonight.
Leclaire: Don't get too comfortable.



The crowd for the game was abysmal. A Tuesday night with record breaking low temps doesn't make for good crowds in a city known for poor sports fans. There were so few people there that night that apparently they were walking around looking for people to ride the zamboni. Guess who they found??? Hell yeah, ME! I had to meet the girl from the Thrashers at Portal 13 ten minutes before the 2nd intermission. I was useless for the rest of the night!


Kaptain Kovy. Stay, go, figure it out, blah.





Hainsey running that mouth of his as usual.





Toby, Kovy and Kaner.





Schubert.





My favorite Slovak, Boris.





Anssi Salmela not looking nearly as serial killer-ish as he did on Casino Night.





Schubie and Zach. Zach was having a wardrobe malfunction. His strings were hanging out and he was adjusting his his pads under his jersey.





Another one for the Anssi lovers.





Leclaire: Dear Lord, please let us win. Please don't let me have to get pulled again. I can't take going back to Ottawa with another loss. Thank you, amen.





Hockey players and their tongues. They can't seem to keep them in their mouths.





Swarming the goalie.





Zach being intense.



Let's play some hockey!





First period!


Opening face off.





Colby in front of the net.





Cool picture that is definitely going to be a favorite this season. Ilya shot it on net and you can see the puck right below Leclaire's glove.





Boris decides Donovan's face needs some help and does so with his fist.





Boris goes to the box and he has a little fan show up to give him some support.





Schubert puts a questionable hit on Cheechoo and is ejected from the game with a game misconduct.





It took them a while to get Cheechoo up, but fortunately he was okay. The crowd of course clapped wildly when he left the ice.





Pavs telling Neil to get the hell out of there.





More scariness when Whitey went down. They had to help him off of the ice, but he eventually came back out and scored a goal!





Leclaire making a save.





Doing the splits.





Ottawa scores, big deal. Enjoy that celebration, it will be the last one of the night.





Woo Hoo! Thrashers score!

The first period was awesome! The Thrashers out shot the Senators 14 to 5 and were leading 3 to 1. One of the goals scored was Eric Boulton's first ever career power play goal!


Second Period! They pulled poor Leclaire and now in goal for Ottawa is Elliot.


Opening face off.





Get that puck, Pavs!

I had to leave the game early to make it over to Portal 13. I turned over camera duties to my husband. He did a good job!




Bolton and his old friend Neil get reacquainted.





Action by Elliot.





Elliot gets a piece of the puck with his glove and sends it flying up.





More action in front of Elliot.





So it's the end of the second period and the Senators woke up and out shot us 17 to 6. Fortunately for us though, the score was 5 to 1 for the Thrashers. And, best of all, it's zamboni time!!!
You go down to the bowels of the arena by the locker rooms. To climb up on the zamboni, they bring a standard ladder like most people have at their house for you to use. I was worried I would look something like this.

It wasn't too bad though. The best part was I had a STAFF of photographers lined up waiting for me. I had 7 people taking pictures and video, I haven't even gotten all of the pictures from everyone.


My eye in the sky and owner of the bad ass Slater/Slayer sign got this one for me. We were waiting for sumo hockey to be done so we could re-finish the ice.





I like the ones my husband took because you can see Michelle taking pictures of me in the background.





I was glad I got the Moulson zamboni, apparently he is the cool driver.





He kept moving up and backing up over and over. It was kind of bumpy at first.





Woo Hoo! There I am on the jumbo tron, well my back anyway.





I'm so excited I had to do the double handed wave.





Coming around the corner.





Michelle got these shots.





More me. (can there ever be enough?)





I just noticed I'm not waiving a lot in the pictures, but I was a waving fool!





There's what Sonya calls the "rubber hand" wave. My hand is bent funny.





I'm waiving at my subjects. Actually some friends had come down to the glass.





And, if 2,482,281 pictures aren't enough, Michelle got video!


and


Can you believe all the pics? My friend (and Casino Night date) Sonya's husband said it was the most documented zamboni ride of all time and would heretofore be known as "the ride.

Third period!


No opening face off, I was too jacked up!


Action in front of Elliot.





Pavs making some saves.





Max getting behind the goalie to make something happen.





Woo Hoo! Thrashers win their first game in regulation since late November!





My new friend Natalie talking with the first star of the game, Ondrej Pavelic. Pavs made 30 saves and got an assist!






Thrashers win! So there is a post game show guest. It's Eric Boulton! You can see he has an ice pack Saran Wrapped to his arm.





Darren Eliot and Boultsie talking shop. I love this picture because Eric is smiling. He's a tough bastard on the ice, but a really nice guy. Always super sweet and funny with the kids at the rink. Congrats on the PPG, Boultsie! Maybe they'll try you on the PP more now.