Edmonton Oilers: Life as an Oilers Fan, The Early Years
Man, isn’t August just a snore for hockey fans? Ivan Hlinka tournament aside, I’m feeling pretty hockey starved. As the 2018/19 season comes, I wanted to take some time to reminisce on my time growing up at Rexall.
Edmonton Oilers: See hockey’s always been with me as long as I could remember. Right from birth, I was absorbed into hockey and its culture, being named after Ryan Smyth himself. While I was growing up, I idolised him, Imagining that I was him while I First learned to skate.
I probably had never cried as much as 9-year-old me did when he was traded. I remember pretending I was sick from school the next day because I was just that broken up about it.
Unfortunately, I wasn’t old enough to understand what was going on during the cup run in ’06 so I don’t have many memories of it. The one I do have is my uncle screaming “SHIRTS OFF FOR HORCOFF.” I still yell that from time to time in public, it gets a lot of laughs. The playoff run, however, the playoff run did change my life in another way.
Following that run, my dad decided to get season sets and went on the waitlist. For three or four years we sat on the list before finally getting them. In the meantime, we had power packs in the nose-bleeds. Do any of you out there remember not being able to see the ice properly because the catwalk was in the way?
Early Rexall Memories
Say what you want about Rexall place but being a fan in that old barn was something special. Even though I only got to spend 5 or 6 years there, it’ll always be home. See my dad and I we didn’t get a lot of time to spend together during winters. His work made it hard for him, but those 3 hours we’d spend at Oilers games, those were magical.
From the long concession lines in the cramped concourse to the way the sound from fans seemed to echo and reverberate in the stands, to the seat that I sat in for four years that still has my name etched into the old paint. Rexall is home.
Way back when I was 10 or 11, the Oilers had this hollowed out Zamboni, and they would let kids ride in it during one of the intermissions. My dad (Thanks Dad!) got me a ticket to sit in that Zamboni, and it was a mind-blowing experience.
Time froze as I went out onto the ice. Just staring at it up close you could see all the chips, ruts, and skate marks left in the ice from the period prior. Looking out across that sheet was a mesmerising experience. There was so much beauty in something that minutes prior was the site of an all-out brawl between two teams… I was entranced…
RELATED PRODUCT
Edmonton Oilers BRXLZ Logo
Buy Now!
Buy Now!
…Then I looked up at the jumbotron and realised the camera had been zoomed in on my face the entire time. That was both the coolest, and most embarrassing night I had at Rexall Place.
One of my other favourite Rexall stories happened during the Dustin Penner era in Edmonton. See when we first got our season seats they were in the Molson Canadian Fan Zone (AKA the everybody has had five beers too many zones). Which often meant that we sat next to some colourful characters. Like this one lady that whipped off her shirt and flashed the Jumbotron when I was in the third grade, or the guy who helped me stack eight popcorn tubs on my head back when popcorn came in tubs.
I remember so clearly sitting there while a guy two rows behind us screamed: “GO EARN YOUR FREAKING PANCAKES YOU FAT SACK.” He might not have said sack or freaking… He also continued yelling that whenever Penner came off the bench, Good times.
Favourite Early Oilers Player
Now Ryan Smyth might be my namesake but Ales Hemsky is and will always be my favourite hockey player. Now I know that seemed a little out-of-place in this “narrative”, but I rarely get to talk about this, and I’m excited.
See I’m a scrawny little guy, my nickname for a while at school was shrimp. So, when I went out and saw this smaller guy bobbing and weaving through guys, I got hooked. I mean watch this, it still gives me goosebumps.
I still have a poster framed in my room from that goal. His combination of cerebral play, hand-eye, and speed was mesmerising. I can watch Hemsky highlight reels for days straight and still be amazed. It is too bad Robyn Regher made it his personal vendetta to kill his career.
Of course, nothing good lasts forever, and Hemsky was traded to Ottawa. I still remember his last goal, also against Ottawa, and tearing up, knowing my hero was about to be traded away.
Thanks for all the memories, Hemmer.
Those were some of my early experiences as a fan at Rexall Place. That upbringing is what helped sow the seeds for what I am today.
From working on getting my degree in journalism so I can work for an NHL team (hopefully) to writing on this website. It all started from the day I was named. Once an Oilers fan, Always an Oilers fan.
(P.S those pyjama jerseys am I right? Someone had to have been fired over those.)