Hurricanes games are just better when you sit on the glass!

Last Tuesday night, Chase and I went to the Carolina Hurricanes game using some of SciQuest's corporate tickets.  SciQuest has a about 10 or 12 tickets to every game scattered around the arena, but the good ones are right down on the glass...front row!  I am able to get these tickets for 2 or 3 games every year, so this was not Chase's first game sitting on the glass.  However, as he gets older and starts to understand the game of hockey more and more, he seems to have more and more fun each time we go.

Not only are these tickets on the glass, but they are in the corner of the arena where the visiting team enters and exits the ice.  On Tuesday night, the Canes were playing the Nashville Predators so we got to see them up close as they entered the ice to start the game.  The action was right there in front of us!

In fact, sometimes, it was really close!!

Towards the end of the 1st period, the Hurricanes got the puck down into our corner (which was their offensive end at that time) and Andrej Nestrasil did a spin move and flipped the puck in front of the net where Jeff Skinner scored a goal to take a 1-0 lead.  That was cool, but then they celebrated right in front of us.  Even cooler, was that we saw ourselves on the jumbo-tron high above the ice.
We watched SportsCenter the next morning and it wasn't televised, but we did find it on YouTube (video here) so we could see ourselves.  There is a quick glimpse of us at the 0:03 mark, and then another long distance shot of us at the 0:12 mark.  Here's what that one looks like:

The other really cool part of the night was at the end of the first period.  The Predators came off the ice into the tunnel...

Shortly after the team went into the tunnel, one of the Predators' staff-members came off the ice and handed us a broken stick from one of the players.  Technically, it was just cracked (about a foot from the top), but it was obviously taken out of play so he was just giving it to a fan...and Chase was the nearest kid to where he came off the ice, so Chase got it.

Turns out, the stick was that of Eric Nystrom, so we got a picture of him coming off the ice at the end of the 2nd period.  He's # 24 right there.

Chase thoroughly enjoyed the night.  In addition to the game, he also got to chat with his buddy Alex (Jon and Dana Tiller's son) the entire night.  And trust me, two six year olds can chat through the ENTIRE game!

A few days later, we finally had some time to hang the stick on Chase's wall in his bedroom.  We hung it right under another stick he got under the same circumstances last year.  That one, from a Philadelphia Flyers player named Andrej Meszaros, was totally broken in half.  Chase doesn't really understand that most kids never get close to the ice, much less get any souvenirs.  Chase has already gotten two broken sticks and 4 or 5 pucks from NHL games!!