No, we are counting down to October 9 when the Jets host the Habs. Why this date for a countdown and not the NHL Premiere? There are a few reasons. The most important being that I forgot that the NHL season doesn't necessarily begin when the Jets season begins and I already did the calculations and figured out what I'm going to talk about on what day.
So what will I be talking about? A few things. I'm going to try and preview upcoming Jets opponents before the games happen, hopefully on Sundays for games coming up that week. This will not include preseason games which start on September 20 in split squad action against the Blue Jackets.
But that's not the countdown. That's a week before. No, the countdown, which will start on Thursday, Sept 15 will be looking at something many of us look at during hockey games.
Can you guess what it is? This is the hint I gave earlier:
"To put it kinda in hockey terms, the division winners of this little experiment would probably have to be (in no particular order) the Carolina Hurricanes, Chicago Blackhawks, Dallas Stars, Los Angeles Kings, and New York Islanders.
"The Buffalo Sabres, Montreal Canadiens, Minnesota Wild, San Jose Sharks, Colorado Avalanche, Winnipeg Jets, and St. Louis Blues are all in the penalty box.
"The New York Rangers have a game misconduct.
"The Detroit Red Wings, Vancouver Canucks and Ottawa Senators all got whistled for icing. Not the worst penalty, but still something you should avoid."
Give up?
The Ice Girls of the NHL.
You know who I'm talking about. They are wearing slimfitting outfits, often with bare stomachs. They sometimes only stay in the crowd, some are on the ice doing the work of scooping up snow during TV timeouts. They assist the mascots. They cheer. They smile. They look good.
The Carolina Hurricanes, Chicago Blackhawks, Dallas Stars, Los Angeles Kings, and New York Islanders all have very well known squads that are frequently compared to each other as being the best in the League. Division winners. The Thrashers Blue Crew was also mentioned in that group from time to time, but they are now gone.
The Buffalo Sabres, Montreal Canadiens, Minnesota Wild, San Jose Sharks, Colorado Avalanche, Winnipeg Jets, and St. Louis Blues do not appear to have a female ice crew. So that's going to get them in the penalty box for this countdown. I know, I know. That's probably not a PC thing for me to say, but there you go. Many would argue that cheerleader girls don't belong in hockey as they demean, lower the quality of the game, or whatever, and that's fine to have that opinion. I'm not saying you have to agree with me. Personally, I don't think they take away from the game. But since I'm going a countdown looking at the cheerleader ice crews and they don't have them, then I have to mention that.
The Detroit Red Wings, Vancouver Canucks and Ottawa Senators do not have a cheerleading type female ice crew, but that doesn't mean they are lacking in having some nice looking staff members. You'll see.
A group I forgot to mention that deserves maybe a "Mr. Irrelevant" award would be the ice crew of the Colorado Avalanche. We'll talk about them later.
But first, the New York Rangers. How I don't like them. For a number of reasons. I'm kinda anti-New York in many sports teams (I'm ok with the Giants football team, and by ok I mean I don't hate them). But the Rangers swept the Thrashers in their only playoff apperance. So I have to hate for that. But in context of this cheerleader ice crew countdown, they deserve to be hated. By everyone.
Here's why.
Back on April 3, 2007, the New York Rangers were playing at the New York Islanders. (remember, they are one of the elite Ice Crews). The girls come out to get rid of the snow around the nets. Rangers goaltender Henrik Lundqvist declined to move and used his stick to whack the squeegee Kelli Higgins was using to push the snow into a pile during the first TV timeout, knocking the butt end of the squeegee stick into her stomach.
"I said 'Excuse me' maybe two or three times," Higgins said. "He didn't move and didn't say anything, so I gave up and went around him. The tip of my squeegee kind of hit the tip of his stick. I don't know if he thought I did that on purpose or whatever, but he took a big windup and slashed the squeegee pretty good. It startled me a little bit. It didn't feel great, but I wouldn't say I was injured or in a ton of pain. I was shocked."
But then, it gets worse.
Chanel Benson had the squeegee during the second TV timeout. This time, a linesman told her to clean around Lundqvist but not in the crease or the net. As she was leaving the ice, Benson skated near the boards in front of both benches, which are separated only by a panel of glass located at the center red line.
"All of a sudden, my back got wet," said Benson, who was wearing a standard outfit of pants and top that leaves the midriff area exposed. "I believe one of the Rangers players who was sitting along the wall spit on my back. It had to be on purpose because I wasn't directly in front of anyone to spit and not realize I was there."
I hate the Rangers.
They hit Ice Girls' squeegees.
They spit on Ice Girls.
So if you see this guy...
...tell him he's a jerk. He's a damn good hockey goalie, but also kinda a jerk.
Now, let me address a few things. The postings are not being done in a particular order (for the most part). So just because one group is being featured tomorrow doesn't mean I think their girls are the best looking or worst.
Also, I will try to present a look at the most current squad, but some pictures are just too good to ignore.
Third, I am presenting them via links. So if you don't want to see all the cute girls, don't click on the links. I figure that's the best way to avoid featuring an abundance of ladies that will cloud from the other awesomeness that is on this blog. Plus, it makes me look like less of a pig if I do it that way.
These ladies actually do good work. Dare I say that most squads not only act as cheerleaders in the crowd, but also work on the ice to clear the snow, collect debris tossed by fans, and are a visual representation of the team. And if you actually read the bios, they have real jobs. This is just a side gig. And those real jobs are diverse and not what you would always expect.
It really is kinda a cross section of "who are hockey fans". It is amazing what actually takes place with the ice squads. Sure, they look good. And they have to be in good physical condition to keep up the looks. But the ice crews have to be ready to take to the ice at anytime to deal with unexpected problems. They have to be able to skate out, shovel up snow while avoiding players, and get off in about 90 seconds. That doesn't seem like much, but it ain't easy.
I have known a few ice girls and sports cheerleaders, as in I had conversations with them as a friend or co-worker in a different capacity than just rah-rah, skate-skate. One worked as a leader with another team and basically had to stop being on the ice crew because of the complications in being such a visual part of another team. She is now working in a leadership role at Madison Square Garden. Yes, home to the New York Rangers. Irony. Another girl worked at a radio station, modeled on the side, and is now working for a promotions agency (in the office) down in Florida. The final girl was multitalented. She worked for another sports office in the sales department, she was on the ice crew, and she was the backup singer for the National Anthem for the Thrashers. Dare I say you may have seen her perform. And she was great!
So these girls are real people. It is important to remember that the whole smiling cheerleader thing is an act. Yeah, some people are that airheaded all the time, but most of the professional cheerleaders are not. They need to have good time management, awareness of their situation for their safety and others (remember, they often shoot the t-shirt guns), and they have a lot of responsibilities than just looking good. You can't be airheaded and be a good professional cheerleader. You won't make it.
Some argue they aren't necessary and take away from the sport. But sports these days are spectacle and entertainment. I know that not every team has the ice girls, and that's their decision. But you can't use the argument they distract from the sport anymore than everything else a team does that is considered appropriate, common, and traditional. Unless a "purest team" does away with their pre-game videos, goal scoring songs, cheers and chants, music during breaks in the action, and everything else that is not laid out in the rule books as essential to the game, than find another argument. Seriously, a team should skate out, play the game in silence except for un-evoked responses from the crowd, the PA announcements, and goal horns, and then retire to the locker rooms with no games or other entertainment inbetween periods. Then, if a team does that, they can argue a sports versus flair arguement. The two have joined and aren't oppossing sides. Sports has flair today. Period. Some just choose to add pretty girls as part of their flair.
Now, you could argue it demeans the girls by putting them up as eye candy for the guys to oogle at. And, yes, that's true. Men look at pretty girls. But that's the point. They are a visual element of the team. Like the mascot. Yeah, they are not essential, but why not have something entertaining and fun to look at? You have to have someone clean the ice. Why not pretty girls? It adds the subliminal bonus of associating something that gives good feelings (pretty girls) with your team. Don't forget too that the job is voluntary and the girls know what they are getting into. Some people actually like attention, so why not get paid for it whilst cheering on your team?
You also want your crowd rallying at appropriate times. We need people to lead cheers. Cheerleaders, if you will. There are not cheerleaders in other countries, true. But that is not the American culture in sports and I think it has to do with our American ways. Canadian way too. We tend to follow popular trends, but left to our own devices, we tend to compete against one another or be lackluster. So let's look at it in an arena crowd aspect.
If there was no indicator from anyone in an official capacity, we would try to create our own cheers. Some would catch on, but there would be a lot of competition in perfecting timing, wording, and other elements. Not everyone would agree and there would be some discord. Eventually, it would work itself out. But that's eventually. We don't have time for eventually, even if it would work itself out over the course of a game. People would get annoyed early, late, or never care enough to notice. Think of the wave at a baseball game. If you've ever seen it get started by a fan, it never never never works out well the first couple of tries. They can't motivate people to act in unision. Eventually, it might work out and you get a good wave going on. But it fizzles. And not all at once. Why? Because there's no one leading it.
Step in the cheerleaders. They tell us what to yell, when to yell, and how long to yell. Almost every single sport has cheerleaders in some capacity. Sometimes it's the girls with pom-poms. Sometimes it's the PA announcer. Sometimes it's the mascot. Sometimes it's the music over the sound system. Sometimes it's directly written on the board (Louder!). Hell, even golf has cheerleaders of a sort. Those guys with the signs that say "Quiet"? They are leading the cheer of silence. And why do we need those signs? To preserve the sport. Golf is a thinking game and preventing sound lets the athletes think better. Left to our own devices, we would yell during the swings to distract the golfer. The golf cheerleaders with their signs let us know when to cheer to preserve and not prevert the sport.
Hockey is the same way. Once upon a time, there were no cheerleaders and people would yell and scream when they saw fit. I don't know if they were yelling at the wrong times or they were saying the wrong things or not. Perhaps they needed help channeling their energy in an appropriate way. Or, maybe sports lost its appeal with the inventions of television and such. We are such a people of instant gratification, maybe we lost the ability to maintain the excitement we craved in early sports days. Or maybe people were yelling too much. Somewhere, someone thought that we need to focus this energy to maximize our home ice. Cheerleaders (electronic, girl, or otherwise) stepped in.
Even sports in other countries that don't have official cheerleaders, there are cheerleaders there all the same in the stands. I promise someone has to start a chant and others quickly join in. But why doesn't that work here?
We also like order. We don't like things to be jumbled and disorganized. Have you seen our streets? They have lines and everything. Have you seen other countries driving? It is so much more disorganized than us. Those European roundabouts or those crazy roads in India are examples of accepted chaos we don't endure here. We have stricter schedules. We have tighter regulations on so many things, we just expect people to tell us what to do. We need cheerleaders of some kind in so many other areas of our lives, we need them in our entertainment as well. Why not have a cute girl that we want to look at anyway do it in the sporting arena? They tell us to do things everywhere else. Drink beer, get hot girls. Buy this phone service because this cute girl is using it. A pretty girl at a home improvement store? I suddenly need to go buy a new paintbrush.
And, going back to the following popular trends, pretty people are popular. It's just truth. So have a group of pretty people doing something and encouraging others to do it too. People will follow and do what you want them to. In this case, cheer. And that's good for the team, feeding off the good energy of the crowd.
That's my rambling argument in favor of teams that choose to have cheerleaders (ice girls). I don't know if that makes any sense. I'm kinda tired and I really don't feel like re-reading this right now. You may come back to this post later and see some parts removed or edited.
We will start tomorrow with the Carolina Hurricanes Storm Squad. I am starting with them for a few reasons we will discuss tomorrow, but they do hold a special place in my heart.
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